Tarot Reading What lies in my future?
Reading Performed 09/21/2014 at 2:57 AM
Click or scroll down for the meaning of each position and the interpretation of its card.
Visual Layout
Card One
Five of Pentacles from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
The card foretells material trouble above all, whether in the form illustrated--that is, destitution--or otherwise. For some cartomancists, it is a card of love and lovers-wife, husband, friend, mistress; also concordance, affinities. These alternatives cannot be harmonized.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings
Success coming that will balance loss.
Card Description
Two mendicants in a snow-storm pass a lighted casement.
Card Two
The Emperor from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
Benevolence, compassion, credit; also confusion to enemies, obstruction, immaturity.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings (When Upright)
Will.
Card Description
He has a form of the Crux ansata for his sceptre and a globe in his left hand. He is a crowned monarch--commanding, stately, seated on a throne, the arms of which axe fronted by rams\' heads. He is executive and realization, the power of this world, here clothed with the highest of its natural attributes. He is occasionally represented as seated on a cubic stone, which, however, confuses some of the issues. He is the virile power, to which the Empress responds, and in this sense is he who seeks to remove the Veil of Isis; yet she remains virgo intacta. It should be understood that this card and that of the Empress do not precisely represent the condition of married life, though this state is implied. On the surface, as I have indicated, they stand for mundane royalty, uplifted on the seats of the mighty; but above this there is the suggestion of another presence. They signify also--and the male figure especially--the higher kingship, occupying the intellectual throne. Hereof is the lordship of thought rather than of the animal world. Both personalities, after their own manner, are "full of strange experience," but theirs is not consciously the wisdom which draws from a higher world. The Emperor has been described as (a) will in its embodied form, but this is only one of its applications, and (b) as an expression of virtualities contained in the Absolute Being--but this is fantasy.
Card Three
Queen of Cups from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Beautiful, fair, dreamy--as one who sees visions in a cup. This is, however, only one of her aspects; she sees, but she also acts, and her activity feeds her dream.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings
A fair woman. The loved one. The mistress of a house.
Card Description
Beautiful, fair, dreamy--as one who sees visions in a cup. This is, however, only one of her aspects; she sees, but she also acts, and her activity feeds her dream.
Card Four
Seven of Pentacles from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
Cause for anxiety regarding money which it may be proposed to lend.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings (When Upright)
A large fortune.
Card Description
A young man, leaning on his staff, looks intently at seven pentacles attached to a clump of greenery on his right; one would say that these were his treasures and that his heart was there.
Card Five
Ten of Pentacles from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
A man and woman beneath an archway which gives entrance to a house and domain. They are accompanied by a child, who looks curiously at two dogs accosting an ancient personage seated in the foreground. The child'Gain, riches; family matters, archives, extraction, the abode of a family.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings
Great successes and great reverses.
Card Description
A man and woman beneath an archway which gives entrance to a house and domain. They are accompanied by a child, who looks curiously at two dogs accosting an ancient personage seated in the foreground. The child's hand is on one of them.
Card Six
Page of Swords from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Authority, overseeing, secret service, vigilance, spying, examination, and the qualities thereto belonging.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings
A child. An enemy. Bad news. Delay.
Card Description
A lithe, active figure holds a sword upright in both hands, while in the act of swift walking. He is passing over rugged land, and about his way the clouds are collocated wildly. He is alert and lithe, looking this way and that, as if an expected enemy might appear at any moment.
Related Posts
Card Seven
Ten of Cups from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Contentment, repose of the entire heart; the perfection of that state; also perfection of human love and friendship; if with several picture-cards, a person who is taking charge of the Querent's interests; also the town, village or country inhabited by the Querent.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings
Uncertainty.
Card Description
Appearance of Cups in a rainbow; it is contemplated in wonder and ecstacy by a man and woman below, evidently husband and wife. His right arm is about her; his left is raised upward; she raises her right arm. The two children dancing near them have not observed the prodigy but are happy after their own manner. There is a home-scene beyond.
Card Eight
The World from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
Inertia, fixity, stagnation, permanence.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings (When Upright)
Assured Success.
Card Description
As this final message of the Major Trumps is unchanged--and indeed unchangeable--in respect of its design, it has been partly described already regarding its deeper sense. It represents also the perfection and end of the Cosmos, the secret which is within it, the rapture of the universe when it understands itself in God. It is further the state of the soul in the consciousness of Divine Vision, reflected from the self-knowing spirit. But these meanings are without prejudice to that which I have said concerning it on the material side. It has more than one message on the macrocosmic side and is, for example, the state of the restored world when the law of manifestation shall have been carried to the highest degree of natural perfection. But it is perhaps more especially a story of the past, referring to that day when all was declared to be good, when the morning stars sang together and all the Sons of God shouted for joy. One of the worst explanations concerning it is that the figure symbolizes the Magus when he has reached the highest degree of initiation; another account says that it represents the absolute, which is ridiculous. The figure has been said to stand for Truth, which is, however, more properly allocated to the seventeenth card. Lastly, it has been called the Crown of the Magi.
Card Nine
The Moon from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
Instability, inconstancy, silence, lesser degrees of deception and error.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings (When Upright)
Hidden Enemies. Danger.
Card Description
The distinction between this card and some of the conventional types is that the moon is increasing on what is called the side of mercy, to the right of the observer. It has sixteen chief and sixteen secondary rays. The card represents life of the imagination apart from life of the spirit. The path between the towers is the issue into the unknown. The dog and wolf are the fears of the natural mind in the presence of that place of exit, when there is only reflected light to guide it. The last reference is a key to another form of symbolism. The intellectual light is a reflection and beyond it is the unknown mystery which it cannot shew forth. It illuminates our animal nature, types of which are represented below--the dog, the wolf and that which comes up out of the deeps, the nameless and hideous tendency which is lower than the savage beast. It strives to attain manifestation, symbolized by crawling from the abyss of water to the land, but as a rule it sinks back whence it came. The face of the mind directs a calm gaze upon the unrest below; the dew of thought falls; the message is: Peace, be still; and it may be that there shall come a calm upon the animal nature, while the abyss beneath shall cease from giving up a form.
Card Ten
King of Cups from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
Dishonest, double-dealing man; roguery, exaction, injustice, vice, scandal, pillage, considerable loss.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings (When Upright)
A fair man. A friend. A barrister, judge, or ecclesiastic. A bachelor.
Card Description
He holds a short sceptre in his left hand and a great cup in his right; his throne is set upon the sea; on one side a ship is riding and on the other a dolphin is leaping. The implicit is that the Sign of the Cup naturally refers to water, which appears in all the court cards.
Card Eleven
Eight of Cups from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
Great joy, happiness, feasting.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings (When Upright)
Jealousy and trouble.
Card Description
A man of dejected aspect is deserting the cups of his felicity, enterprise, undertaking or previous concern.
Card Twelve
Six of Wands from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
The card has been so designed that it can cover several significations; on the surface, it is a victor triumphing, but it is also great news, such as might be carried in state by the King's courier; it is expectation crowned with its own desire, the crown of hope, and so forth.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings
Failure.
Card Description
A laurelled horseman bears one staff adorned with a laurel crown; footmen with staves are at his side.
Card Thirteen
Six of Cups from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
A card of the past and of memories, looking back, as--for example--on childhood; happiness, enjoyment, but coming rather from the past; things that have vanished. Another reading reverses this, giving new relations, new knowledge, new environment, and then the children are disporting in an unfamiliar precinct.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings
Obstacles insuperable. Widowhood. Separation.
Card Description
Children in an old garden, their cups filled with flowers.
Card Fourteen
The Lovers from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Attraction, love, beauty, trials overcome.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings
Love.
Card Description
The sun shines in the zenith, and beneath is a great winged figure with arms extended, pouring down influences. In the foreground are two human figures, male and female, unveiled before each other, as if Adam and Eve when they first occupied the paradise of the earthly body. Behind the man is the Tree of Life, bearing twelve fruits, and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil is behind the woman; the serpent is twining round it. The figures suggest youth, virginity, innocence and love before it is contaminated by gross material desire. This is in all simplicity the card of human love, here exhibited as part of the way, the truth and the life. It replaces, by recourse to first principles, the old card of marriage, which I have described previously, and the later follies which depicted man between vice and virtue. In a very high sense, the card is a mystery of the Covenant and Sabbath. The suggestion in respect of the woman is that she signifies that attraction towards the sensitive life which carries within it the idea of the Fall of Man, but she is rather the working of a Secret Law of Providence than a willing and conscious temptress. It is through her imputed lapse that man shall arise ultimately, and only by her can he complete himself. The card is therefore in its way another intimation concerning the great mystery of womanhood. The old meanings fall to pieces of necessity with the old pictures, but even as interpretations of the latter, some of them were of the order of commonplace and others were false in symbolism.
Card Fifteen
Nine of Wands from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
The card signifies strength in opposition. If attacked, the person will meet an onslaught boldly; and his build shews, that he may prove a formidable antagonist. With this main significance there are all its possible adjuncts--delay, suspension, adjournment.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings
Great success.
Card Description
The figure leans upon his staff and has an expectant look, as if awaiting an enemy. Behind are eight other staves--erect, in orderly disposition, like a palisade.
Card Sixteen
Knight of Pentacles from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Utility, serviceableness, interest, responsibility, rectitude-all on the normal and external plane.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings
A young, fair man. A stranger. An arrival.
Card Description
He rides a slow, enduring, heavy horse, to which his own aspect corresponds. He exhibits his symbol, but does not look therein.
Card Seventeen
Ace of Pentacles from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Perfect contentment, felicity, ecstasy; also speedy intelligence; gold.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings
Commencement of good fortune. Inheritance. Gifts. Economy.
Card Description
A hand--issuing, as usual, from a cloud--holds up a pentacle.
Card Eighteen
Ten of Swords from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Whatsoever is intimated by the design; also pain, affliction, tears, sadness, desolation. It is not especially a card of violent death.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings
Uncertainty in the hatred.
Card Description
A prostrate figure, pierced by all the swords belonging to the card.
Card Nineteen
Five of Cups from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
News, alliances, affinity, consanguinity, ancestry, return, false projects.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings (When Upright)
Obstacles overcome.
Card Description
A dark, cloaked figure, looking sideways at three prone cups two others stand upright behind him; a bridge is in the background, leading to a small keep or holding.
Card Twenty
The Hanged Man from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
Selfishness, the crowd, body politic.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings (When Upright)
Trials. Sacrifice.
Card Description
The gallows from which he is suspended forms a Tau cross, while the figure--from the position of the legs--forms a fylfot cross. There is a nimbus about the head of the seeming martyr. It should be noted (1) that the tree of sacrifice is living wood, with leaves thereon; (2) that the face expresses deep entrancement, not suffering; (3) that the figure, as a whole, suggests life in suspension, but life and not death. It is a card of profound significance, but all the significance is veiled. One of his editors suggests that Eliphas Levi did not know the meaning, which is unquestionable nor did the editor himself. It has been called falsely a card of martyrdom, a card a of prudence, a card of the Great Work, a card of duty; but we may exhaust all published interpretations and find only vanity. I will say very simply on my own part that it expresses the relation, in one of its aspects, between the Divine and the Universe. He who can understand that the story of his higher nature is imbedded in this symbolism will receive intimations concerning a great awakening that is possible, and will know that after the sacred Mystery of Death there is a glorious Mystery of Resurrection.
Card Twenty One
Seven of Swords from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Design, attempt, wish, hope, confidence; also quarrelling, a plan that may fail, annoyance. The design is uncertain in its import, because the significations are widely at variance with each other.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings
Enemy successful.
Card Description
A man in the act of carrying away five swords rapidly; the two others of the card remain stuck in the ground. A camp is close at hand.
The Meanings of these Tarot Cards
Card One
Five of Pentacles from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
The card foretells material trouble above all, whether in the form illustrated--that is, destitution--or otherwise. For some cartomancists, it is a card of love and lovers-wife, husband, friend, mistress; also concordance, affinities. These alternatives cannot be harmonized.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings
Success coming that will balance loss.
Card Description
Two mendicants in a snow-storm pass a lighted casement.
Card Two
The Emperor from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
Benevolence, compassion, credit; also confusion to enemies, obstruction, immaturity.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings (When Upright)
Will.
Card Description
He has a form of the Crux ansata for his sceptre and a globe in his left hand. He is a crowned monarch--commanding, stately, seated on a throne, the arms of which axe fronted by rams\' heads. He is executive and realization, the power of this world, here clothed with the highest of its natural attributes. He is occasionally represented as seated on a cubic stone, which, however, confuses some of the issues. He is the virile power, to which the Empress responds, and in this sense is he who seeks to remove the Veil of Isis; yet she remains virgo intacta. It should be understood that this card and that of the Empress do not precisely represent the condition of married life, though this state is implied. On the surface, as I have indicated, they stand for mundane royalty, uplifted on the seats of the mighty; but above this there is the suggestion of another presence. They signify also--and the male figure especially--the higher kingship, occupying the intellectual throne. Hereof is the lordship of thought rather than of the animal world. Both personalities, after their own manner, are "full of strange experience," but theirs is not consciously the wisdom which draws from a higher world. The Emperor has been described as (a) will in its embodied form, but this is only one of its applications, and (b) as an expression of virtualities contained in the Absolute Being--but this is fantasy.
Card Three
Queen of Cups from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Beautiful, fair, dreamy--as one who sees visions in a cup. This is, however, only one of her aspects; she sees, but she also acts, and her activity feeds her dream.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings
A fair woman. The loved one. The mistress of a house.
Card Description
Beautiful, fair, dreamy--as one who sees visions in a cup. This is, however, only one of her aspects; she sees, but she also acts, and her activity feeds her dream.
Card Four
Seven of Pentacles from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
Cause for anxiety regarding money which it may be proposed to lend.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings (When Upright)
A large fortune.
Card Description
A young man, leaning on his staff, looks intently at seven pentacles attached to a clump of greenery on his right; one would say that these were his treasures and that his heart was there.
Card Five
Ten of Pentacles from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
A man and woman beneath an archway which gives entrance to a house and domain. They are accompanied by a child, who looks curiously at two dogs accosting an ancient personage seated in the foreground. The child'Gain, riches; family matters, archives, extraction, the abode of a family.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings
Great successes and great reverses.
Card Description
A man and woman beneath an archway which gives entrance to a house and domain. They are accompanied by a child, who looks curiously at two dogs accosting an ancient personage seated in the foreground. The child's hand is on one of them.
Card Six
Page of Swords from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Authority, overseeing, secret service, vigilance, spying, examination, and the qualities thereto belonging.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings
A child. An enemy. Bad news. Delay.
Card Description
A lithe, active figure holds a sword upright in both hands, while in the act of swift walking. He is passing over rugged land, and about his way the clouds are collocated wildly. He is alert and lithe, looking this way and that, as if an expected enemy might appear at any moment.
Related Posts
Card Seven
Ten of Cups from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Contentment, repose of the entire heart; the perfection of that state; also perfection of human love and friendship; if with several picture-cards, a person who is taking charge of the Querent's interests; also the town, village or country inhabited by the Querent.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings
Uncertainty.
Card Description
Appearance of Cups in a rainbow; it is contemplated in wonder and ecstacy by a man and woman below, evidently husband and wife. His right arm is about her; his left is raised upward; she raises her right arm. The two children dancing near them have not observed the prodigy but are happy after their own manner. There is a home-scene beyond.
Card Eight
The World from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
Inertia, fixity, stagnation, permanence.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings (When Upright)
Assured Success.
Card Description
As this final message of the Major Trumps is unchanged--and indeed unchangeable--in respect of its design, it has been partly described already regarding its deeper sense. It represents also the perfection and end of the Cosmos, the secret which is within it, the rapture of the universe when it understands itself in God. It is further the state of the soul in the consciousness of Divine Vision, reflected from the self-knowing spirit. But these meanings are without prejudice to that which I have said concerning it on the material side. It has more than one message on the macrocosmic side and is, for example, the state of the restored world when the law of manifestation shall have been carried to the highest degree of natural perfection. But it is perhaps more especially a story of the past, referring to that day when all was declared to be good, when the morning stars sang together and all the Sons of God shouted for joy. One of the worst explanations concerning it is that the figure symbolizes the Magus when he has reached the highest degree of initiation; another account says that it represents the absolute, which is ridiculous. The figure has been said to stand for Truth, which is, however, more properly allocated to the seventeenth card. Lastly, it has been called the Crown of the Magi.
Card Nine
The Moon from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
Instability, inconstancy, silence, lesser degrees of deception and error.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings (When Upright)
Hidden Enemies. Danger.
Card Description
The distinction between this card and some of the conventional types is that the moon is increasing on what is called the side of mercy, to the right of the observer. It has sixteen chief and sixteen secondary rays. The card represents life of the imagination apart from life of the spirit. The path between the towers is the issue into the unknown. The dog and wolf are the fears of the natural mind in the presence of that place of exit, when there is only reflected light to guide it. The last reference is a key to another form of symbolism. The intellectual light is a reflection and beyond it is the unknown mystery which it cannot shew forth. It illuminates our animal nature, types of which are represented below--the dog, the wolf and that which comes up out of the deeps, the nameless and hideous tendency which is lower than the savage beast. It strives to attain manifestation, symbolized by crawling from the abyss of water to the land, but as a rule it sinks back whence it came. The face of the mind directs a calm gaze upon the unrest below; the dew of thought falls; the message is: Peace, be still; and it may be that there shall come a calm upon the animal nature, while the abyss beneath shall cease from giving up a form.
Card Ten
King of Cups from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
Dishonest, double-dealing man; roguery, exaction, injustice, vice, scandal, pillage, considerable loss.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings (When Upright)
A fair man. A friend. A barrister, judge, or ecclesiastic. A bachelor.
Card Description
He holds a short sceptre in his left hand and a great cup in his right; his throne is set upon the sea; on one side a ship is riding and on the other a dolphin is leaping. The implicit is that the Sign of the Cup naturally refers to water, which appears in all the court cards.
Card Eleven
Eight of Cups from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
Great joy, happiness, feasting.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings (When Upright)
Jealousy and trouble.
Card Description
A man of dejected aspect is deserting the cups of his felicity, enterprise, undertaking or previous concern.
Card Twelve
Six of Wands from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
The card has been so designed that it can cover several significations; on the surface, it is a victor triumphing, but it is also great news, such as might be carried in state by the King's courier; it is expectation crowned with its own desire, the crown of hope, and so forth.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings
Failure.
Card Description
A laurelled horseman bears one staff adorned with a laurel crown; footmen with staves are at his side.
Card Thirteen
Six of Cups from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
A card of the past and of memories, looking back, as--for example--on childhood; happiness, enjoyment, but coming rather from the past; things that have vanished. Another reading reverses this, giving new relations, new knowledge, new environment, and then the children are disporting in an unfamiliar precinct.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings
Obstacles insuperable. Widowhood. Separation.
Card Description
Children in an old garden, their cups filled with flowers.
Card Fourteen
The Lovers from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Attraction, love, beauty, trials overcome.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings
Love.
Card Description
The sun shines in the zenith, and beneath is a great winged figure with arms extended, pouring down influences. In the foreground are two human figures, male and female, unveiled before each other, as if Adam and Eve when they first occupied the paradise of the earthly body. Behind the man is the Tree of Life, bearing twelve fruits, and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil is behind the woman; the serpent is twining round it. The figures suggest youth, virginity, innocence and love before it is contaminated by gross material desire. This is in all simplicity the card of human love, here exhibited as part of the way, the truth and the life. It replaces, by recourse to first principles, the old card of marriage, which I have described previously, and the later follies which depicted man between vice and virtue. In a very high sense, the card is a mystery of the Covenant and Sabbath. The suggestion in respect of the woman is that she signifies that attraction towards the sensitive life which carries within it the idea of the Fall of Man, but she is rather the working of a Secret Law of Providence than a willing and conscious temptress. It is through her imputed lapse that man shall arise ultimately, and only by her can he complete himself. The card is therefore in its way another intimation concerning the great mystery of womanhood. The old meanings fall to pieces of necessity with the old pictures, but even as interpretations of the latter, some of them were of the order of commonplace and others were false in symbolism.
Card Fifteen
Nine of Wands from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
The card signifies strength in opposition. If attacked, the person will meet an onslaught boldly; and his build shews, that he may prove a formidable antagonist. With this main significance there are all its possible adjuncts--delay, suspension, adjournment.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings
Great success.
Card Description
The figure leans upon his staff and has an expectant look, as if awaiting an enemy. Behind are eight other staves--erect, in orderly disposition, like a palisade.
Card Sixteen
Knight of Pentacles from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Utility, serviceableness, interest, responsibility, rectitude-all on the normal and external plane.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings
A young, fair man. A stranger. An arrival.
Card Description
He rides a slow, enduring, heavy horse, to which his own aspect corresponds. He exhibits his symbol, but does not look therein.
Card Seventeen
Ace of Pentacles from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Perfect contentment, felicity, ecstasy; also speedy intelligence; gold.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings
Commencement of good fortune. Inheritance. Gifts. Economy.
Card Description
A hand--issuing, as usual, from a cloud--holds up a pentacle.
Card Eighteen
Ten of Swords from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Whatsoever is intimated by the design; also pain, affliction, tears, sadness, desolation. It is not especially a card of violent death.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings
Uncertainty in the hatred.
Card Description
A prostrate figure, pierced by all the swords belonging to the card.
Card Nineteen
Five of Cups from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
News, alliances, affinity, consanguinity, ancestry, return, false projects.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings (When Upright)
Obstacles overcome.
Card Description
A dark, cloaked figure, looking sideways at three prone cups two others stand upright behind him; a bridge is in the background, leading to a small keep or holding.
Card Twenty
The Hanged Man from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
Selfishness, the crowd, body politic.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings (When Upright)
Trials. Sacrifice.
Card Description
The gallows from which he is suspended forms a Tau cross, while the figure--from the position of the legs--forms a fylfot cross. There is a nimbus about the head of the seeming martyr. It should be noted (1) that the tree of sacrifice is living wood, with leaves thereon; (2) that the face expresses deep entrancement, not suffering; (3) that the figure, as a whole, suggests life in suspension, but life and not death. It is a card of profound significance, but all the significance is veiled. One of his editors suggests that Eliphas Levi did not know the meaning, which is unquestionable nor did the editor himself. It has been called falsely a card of martyrdom, a card a of prudence, a card of the Great Work, a card of duty; but we may exhaust all published interpretations and find only vanity. I will say very simply on my own part that it expresses the relation, in one of its aspects, between the Divine and the Universe. He who can understand that the story of his higher nature is imbedded in this symbolism will receive intimations concerning a great awakening that is possible, and will know that after the sacred Mystery of Death there is a glorious Mystery of Resurrection.
Card Twenty One
Seven of Swords from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Design, attempt, wish, hope, confidence; also quarrelling, a plan that may fail, annoyance. The design is uncertain in its import, because the significations are widely at variance with each other.
Papus's Divinatory Meanings
Enemy successful.
Card Description
A man in the act of carrying away five swords rapidly; the two others of the card remain stuck in the ground. A camp is close at hand.
