What is Tarot? A simple, clear description

The Tarot is a very old medium which you can use to gather more insights into the depths of your soul. By letting the archetypical images on the cards take effect onto your sub consciousness, there can be space created around, and visions gathered onto the problems you might have to deal with in your course of life. You can gather insights into various aspects of your daily life, such as love, work, or your own development. The Tarot is NOT a way to predict the future! That would only be possible when we would live in a world where everything in the future would be fixed, and you, with all of your decisions, would not have any influence at all in your own life. The cards never tell you what to do or what you shouldn’t do; you are responsible for your own life. Tarot should never be the only comprehensive guideline in your life. The cards can only help you to show you a way to do things in a different way, look at problems from another point of view; It can show you the answers that are already and always inside of you.

The working method is from the inside out (of you), and that can make it hard for you to get in contact with your inner world, or better, your soul. Tarot can help you to discover what your own, true wisdom is in fact!

The history of the Tarot.

There are a lot of different stories about the history of the Tarot. Some people believe the Tarot comes from Egypt, others say that it comes from the Middle-East. There is also a story that tells you that the Tarot was created, to save ancient history, after the library of Alexandria was burned down. Some people also believe that Tarot has a connection with Atlantis. All this stories, and there are much more, have no prove at all. Historically seen, the first time people ever spoke of the Tarot, was in the 14^th century. It then, was mainly used to teach people how to read and write, and for playing games and gambling. In France, people still play games with the cards. In the 18^th century people began to use the Tarot for Divination. At that time, the pope disliked the Tarot very much, he found it was devilish; he forbade people to use the Tarot, and that was exactly what made it much more popular.

There are 78 Tarot cards: 22 of the Major Arcanum (Arcanum is Latin, and it means: secret), and 56 cards of the minor Arcanum. The cards of the major Arcanum are also called: Trump cards, they show more symbolism and are more important than the cards of the minor Arcanum, these cards are completing the cards of the major Arcanum.

Tarotists.

The theologian Antoine Court de Gebelin, born in Nimes (France) in 1725, was one of the first to study the Tarot descriptively, and wrote about it in his book “Le Monde Primitif”. One of his successors was Aliette, a professor in mathematics. He published under the pseudonym Eteilla and designed his own Tarot deck: the Tarot d’Eteilla. The technique of tarotists was based on the founder of Numerology: Pythagoras, surprising, isn’t it? At school, students will usually only learn what this mysticus / mathematicus did with the quantity of numbers, and not about his philosophy about the quality of the numbers. In the second half of the 19^th century the catholic priest and cabbalist Alphonse Louis Constannt, also known as Eliphas Levi, made the connection between the 22 cards of the Major Arcana and the 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet. He considered the Tarot to be the drawn version of the Cabbala. His greatest work is: “ Dogme et Rituel de la Haute Magie”. This book was published again some time ago in Amsterdam (the Netherlands). It’s a fact that Cabbala and Tarot are pretty much similar and they complement each other obviously. The world of Tarot is still developing today.

The structure of the deck.

The 22 cards of the major Arcanum are:

0- The Fool

1- The Magician

2- The High Priestess

3- The Empress

4- The Emperor

5- The Hierophant

6- The Lovers

7- The Chariot

8- Strength

9- The Hermit

10- Wheel of Fortune

11- Justice

12- The Hanged Man

13- Death

14- Temperance

15- The Devil

16- The Tower

17- The Star

18- The Moon

19- The Sun

20- Judgment

21- The World

These cards represent the different stages in your life, from birth to death. They are the most symbolic part of the Tarot; they represent important changes in your life.

The 56 cards of the minor Arcanum are divided by 4 colors:

-Wands

-Pentacles

- Cups

-Swords

Each color has 14 cards:

10 Number cards, beginning with Ace (=1) to 10

4 Court cards, -King, - Queen, -Prince, -Princess

These cards have much more to do with daily issues.

There are a huge number of different Tarot decks, some traditional, some vastly different. Also, there are ‘Oracle decks’, they are mostly used for inspiration and/or divination and contain images as goddesses, fairy’s, angels etc., they do not follow the traditional structure of the Tarot. The most popular deck in the English-speaking world, is the Rider-Waite-Smith Tarot, when it was published in 1910, Tarot became increasingly popular.

Spreadings

There are a number of different ways to spread the cards, this is depending of what issue there is to be clarified.

See the video to get the general idea

- If you want to have an insight in your actual situation;

- If you want to know the progress of some kind of trend and want to have a glimpse in the near future;

- If you want to know something about yourself;

- If you want advise about what to do in a given situation

In order to interpret the spreadings in the right way, it is necessary to be familiar with the meaning of all 78 cards. If you are a beginner, it maybe is the best way if you only work with the 22 cards of the Major Arcanum for a while. If you want to buy your own deck it is very important to choose one you feel comfortable or even familiar with, handle it with care, put it in a nice box (you can buy them also), or wrap it in a nice piece of clothing.

There are a lot of books that can help you to interpret the cards the right way.

If you pick a day card once every day and study its symbolic meaning attentively, you’ll soon notice that you will become more and more familiar with them. Write down every day what your thoughts and feelings are when you study the card, read it at the end of the day and write down what you’ve experienced at that day. You’ll see how fast your intuition will develop!

When you’re aware of your divinity and tune in onto the highest sources from within yourself, conscious to be a part of the mystery of life, be open and honest and let the Tarot guide you.

Have a lot of fun!

2009-Wilma Cathy E.