Five of Cups – Ten of Swords – Five of Disks
Adoration – Accumulation – Growth
Card of the day: Ten of Swords
Time: 12 PM to 0:40 AM
“Everything that occurs is an accumulation of what you have knowingly or unknowingly set in motion.”
Steven Redhead
– What should you focus on today?
– What should you study more to improve your performance?
Today, I propose another experiment.
What deck and method should be used to get results? It is a question I frequently receive, just like some people ask me why I don’t like the Rider-Waite deck and its clones.
I have already written extensively about the pros and cons of the Rider-Waite and why I consider it a commercial deck with reduced esoteric content and, as such, inappropriate for quality readings.
The readings with the Unified Esoteric Tarot deck offer a particular consistency that is unavailable through other decks.
Due to inappropriate graphical depictions unrelated to the core meaning of the cards, other Tarot decks “inspire” trivial or misleading interpretations.
The obvious question is, what determines the meaning of the cards?
The backbone of the Tarot deck and, implicitly, the meaning of the individual cards originates in astrology. Thus, the Tarot deck is a map of our solar system, and the cards represent the key moments of life.
A correct, or at least appropriate, depiction of the cards should reflect the meaning provided by the astrological aspect associated with the card.
The Rider-Waite deck borrowed the meanings mainly from Etteilla, with a few minor alterations and translation errors, as Waite relied mainly on S. L. MacGregor Mathers’s pamphlet The Tarot from 1888.
Although Etteilla claimed that his deck and reading method rely on astrological and kabbalistic criteria, a clear astrological attribution system was never revealed.
His Suite of Coins features astrological glyphs from Two to Ten on the cards, but those clues are insufficient to draw any conclusion.
Many people assumed that Waite used the Golden Dawn attribution system for the Rider-Waite deck, but this is untrue.
Waite constantly struggled financially. When he saw the Sola-Busca exhibition at the British Museum, he seized the opportunity and hired Pamela Colman Smith to create a Tarot deck with English captions and a fully illustrated Minor Arcana. Waite hoped for generous monetarisation, and everything was done in a hurry. Unfortunately, the Rider-Waite deck was not as successful as he and the publisher would have expected, and the man who eventually managed to make a substantial profit out of their work was Mr Kaplan sixty years later.
An entire Tarot industry has blossomed, mainly on the back of the Rider-Waite deck. Pamela’s original work has been recreated manually and digitally, reimagined, and rethemed hundreds of times repeatedly. If that is not considered intellectual theft, I don’t know what is.
However, the main issue is that very few imitators have made the effort to properly study the original work and the philosophy behind the cards. No matter how surprising it may sound for many, the Tarot is not about its appealing artwork but the hidden – esoteric – content. The only purpose of the artwork is to express the content adequately. Yet, most modern decks are only cloths without content.
Very few people ask whether the Rider-Waite deck reflects the cards’ actual meaning, and if so, which interpretation and based on what? Why does the Three of Swords feature a heart pierced by three swords, not a bouquet of three roses?
Waite invited Pamela Colman Smith to the British Museum. She made sketches, and some images have been transposed into the Rider-Waite deck, as in the case of the Three of Swords. Waite also provided minimal instructions for the Major Arcana cards, including the changes he wanted compared to the Marseille pattern. Regarding the Minor Arcana cards, Waite only presented the interpretation according to Etteilla via Mathers, leaving more room for creativity at the will of Pamela Colman Smith. However, she only had six months to complete the entire deck. While Miss Colman Smith was a talented and experienced illustrator, she lacked esoteric knowledge and training, especially regarding the Tarot.
Moreover, they both were devoted Christians and considered card-reading inappropriate at best. Meanwhile, the lines between the occult and religion have blurred considerably, but things were radically different at the beginning of the twentieth century.
The other thing that crippled the esoteric Tarot tradition was its mingling with New Age ideas. The most destructive idea intensely promoted by publishers and authors was that Tarot is a matter of intuitive interpretation of the cards, usually based on the artwork, and therefore, it doesn’t require learning or knowledge. Everyone can read and interpret the cards without native talent or preparation.
That opened the door to a large number of psychic and non-psychic “psychic readers” and the “free” interpretation of the cards. Depending on what the particular image from a card suggests to one or another reader, they can interpret it as they desire. In other words, they gave a blank license for scammers.
How does the deceit work?
It is pretty simple. Instead of offering answers to the querents, the readers ask personal questions. They don’t read the cards, but the querent, and interpret the cards based on what they tell and what the reader is guessing the querent wants to hear.
For example, the querent draws the Five of Cups, the Ten of Swords and the Five of Disks.
Based on the Five of Cups, the first obvious question is: Have you had a disappointment recently, possibly in love?
The querent may confirm that and even share further details. The more the querents speak and tell about themselves and their current situation, the more the reader will be able to say what they want to hear. While reading the cards is rarely their strong suit, making people speak is their secret weapon.
Depending on the answers provided by the querent and not the reader, the Ten of Swords can be interpreted as the ending of “something”, while the Five of Disks offers an extensive palette of interpretations from “misery loves company” to pilgrimage. The main advantage of intuitive interpretation is that there are no limits virtually. Even when the cards don’t look too bright, there is always room for interpretation. One can say that even if times will be challenging, the Five of Disks shows that you will not be alone.
If you are a querent, try not to answer all those personal questions, and you will see how most “readers” will struggle and miss.
Especially after World War II, many governmental agencies in the West and the East conducted various experiments exploring psychic abilities. Apparently, the Russians were the most advanced and successful. However, it was concluded that very few individuals are truly endowed with so-called paranormal qualities. Even those few naturally gifted individuals provided inconsistent and oscillating results. These are the indisputable facts. Most likely, all the governments are constantly lying and deceiving, but I’m pretty sure no “psychic” Tarot readers are on the paylist of any government. There are multiple reasons for this, but the main reason is that most “readers” are impostors. People may say this is only my subjective opinion, and they might be correct. However, this is based on my experience and a couple of one-on-one engagements with intuitive readers.
On the other hand, Tarot cards have been constantly misused. The Tarot is an efficient instrument for self-knowledge and development, yet most people seem more interested in finding out information about others. Whether it is deceit or self-deceit, people like to believe that third-person readings are possible, and the Tarot is a miraculous, occult spying tool, the card version of the crystal globe. Nothing is further from the truth, but telling the reality is often bad for business, just like most people don’t take no for an answer. People are more interested in blaming and dealing with others than focusing on themselves.
It all comes down to how to formulate an adequate question.
For example, if you ask, “My partner is cheating on me?” the “intuitive” reader knows exactly what answer you are looking for because you served it on a silver plate.
A more efficient way to address the question in similar circumstances would be: “What should I know about my personal relationships?” An open-ended question allows you to discover things you didn’t know without influencing the outcome in any way.
No matter how awkward that may sound, most people are unwilling to face reality. They only want confirmation of their fears or hopes.
In these circumstances, it is quite difficult to determine who is a “good reader”, someone who knows how to read the cards or who reads the querent and gives them the answers they seek.
According to the “by the book” interpretation of the cards, comparing Etteilla’s, Mathers’ and Waite’s points of view is interesting.
The complete text, over 3,000 words, is freely available on my Patreon page:
https://www.patreon.com/attilakarpathy
