Living at the intersection of occultism, fiction and philosophy, I travel the planes at a moderately quick pace. I read, I do magic, I cook for hubby. Confused by the number of things I talk about? Good, confusion is a nice thing ;)
As Christmas draws near I recently bought the ingredients for my home-made 5-hour lasagna sauce. Yesterday I set about preparing it, and I started noticing an odd smell coming from the minced meat, even though it was supposedly fresh.
At first it was barely detactable, so my Christmas spirit decided to interpret it as just a figment of the imagination. The immediate red flag was seeing my husband emerge from his den asking what the strange odor was. Hubby is extremely sensible to smells. Whenever I see him curling his nose I know something is off.
What’s worse, around three hours into the preparation the subtle whiff had turned into a miasma. So I did a geomancy reading, asking if the sauce would be safe to eat.
Before casting the reading I had some doubt on how I would interpret such a question: what astrological house rules food?
In old astrology and geomancy books, when a king asks if the food served at the banquet has been poisoned, usually the diviner consults the fifth house of parties and fun. On the other hand, astrologer John Frawley makes a compelling point that your food is what sustains your person and goes into your throat, which is the second house. I decided that it was useless to worry about these distinctions, and that the chart would find a way to show me the truth.
Is the sauce safe to it? Geomancy reading (app used: Simple Geomancy)
And show me it did. This is a reading that requires very little interpretation. Tristitia is in the first house, portending trouble, and it springs into the sixth house, which is the house of sickness: neither the second house nor the fifth house were involved. The sauce is definitely unsafe.
True, the court is not negative, possibly showing that it wouldn’t cause any major trouble. On the other hand, the Way of the Point goes from the Judge Via to Cauda Draconis in the eighth house, and Cauda is a negative figure, but I doubt the sauce would be the end of us.
I still decided to dump everything out and start from scratch, meaning today I had to run to the market to get new ground meat.
One thing that I often receive messages about is how to understand the order in which the cards fall. Whether it’s the Vera Sibilla or playing card, there is one fundamental rule that applies in the majority of cases: later cards modify those that fall before.
Keep in mind that divination with cards is like the reading of a book, so the cards build the equivalent of sentences with their own grammatical structure. This is why I prefer to read the cards together rather than in isolation, as would happen in many contemporary positional spreads, where to each position corresponds one card.
In the tradition I come from, there can be positions, but there are always at least three cards, and sometimes five, covering one position. When we have two or more cards together, it becomes possible to “agglutinate” their meanings.
“Boy” and “run” becomes “the boy is running.” “Boy” and “friend” becomes “the boy is with a friend” or “the boy is a friend.” “Boy” and “Australian” becomes “the boy is Australian.”
Similarly, if we put two playing cards together such as the Three of Clubs (Union, marriage) and the Ten of Hearts (Happiness) they say: the marriage is happy. In the Sibilla, if we put the Ace of Club (Marriage) and the Four of Hearts (Love) together, it becomes “a loving marriage” or “a marriage of love.”
These are the first steps only. There are many more nunaces. However, the basic thing we must ask ourselves when interpreting two or more cards together is whether they add to each other or they contradict each other.
When they add to each other, the sequence in which they fall doesn’t matter that much (though it may add shades of meaning). “A beautiful girl” is roughly the same as “A girl who is beautiful.” But if we have “War” and “Peace”, saying “Peace and then war” is very different from saying “War and then peace”.
In the Sibilla, Fortune + Death is the end of fortune (literally, “the fortune meets its end”), whereas Death + Fortune is an end that brings fortune. Generally speaking, the cards falling after have the power to modify those that fall before.
That being said, divination is an art more than a science: we should never apply our rules so rigidly that we stop thinking about what the cards are saying. In most cases, in the Sibilla, Thief + Marriage has a similar meaning as Marriage + Thief: someone or something is interfering with the marriage.
Ultimately, each spread is a world in itself and the specific key to it must be found by following the clues that the cards leave behind.
(Note: this is a collection of the meanings attributed to the cards by some occultists in the past centuries. It does not reflect my own study or opinion of the cards. It is only meant as a quick comparative reference as I develop my own take.)
The Five of Pentacles from the Builders of the Adytum (BOTA) tarot deck
Paul Foster Case (and Ann Davies)
The time period is the first decanate of Taurus, under the rulership of Venus, April 20 to 29. Meanings: Well-Dignified: labor, toil, the cultivation of the land; building, and plans concerning it; some anxiety over money. lll-Dignified: toil unrewarded; loss of money; poverty; trouble for the Querent through lack of imagination and foresight. Keyword: Uncertainty; material trouble. (From the Oracle of Tarot course)
A. E. Waite
Two mendicants in a snow-storm pass a lighted casement. Divinatory Meanings: 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. Reversed: Disorder, chaos, ruin, discord, profligacy. (From The Pictorial Key to the Tarot)
Aleister Crowley
The Five of Disks is in equally evil case. The soft quiet of the Four has been completely overthrown; the card is called Worry. [See Skeat, Etymological Dictionary. The idea is of strangling, as dogs worry sheep. Note the identity with Sphinx.] The economic system has broken down; there is no more balance between the social orders. Disks being as they are, stolid and obstinate, as compared with the other weapons, for their revolution serves t9 stabilize them, there is no action, at least not in its own ambit, that can affect the issue.
[…]
The Number Five, Geburah, in the suit of Earth, shows the disruption of the Elements, just as in the other suits. This is emphasized by the rule of Mercury in Taurus, types of energy which are opposed. It needs a very powerful Mercury to upset Taurus; so the natural meaning is Intelligence applied to Labour.
The symbol represents five disks in the form of the inverted Pentagram, instability in the very foundations of Matter. The effect is that of an earthquake. They are, however, representative of the five Tatvas; these hold together, on a very low plane, an organism which would otherwise disrupt completely. The background is an angry, ugly red with yellow markings. The general effect is one of intense strain; yet the symbol implies long-continued inaction. (From The Book of Thoth)
A peasantly mystical AI-generated illustration for the Five of Pentacles
Golden Dawn’s Book T
A WHITE Radiant Angelic Hand issuing from clouds, and holding a branch of the white rose tree, but from which the roses are falling, and leaving no buds behind. Five Pentacles similar to the Ace. Above and below are Mercury and Taurus.
Loss of money or position. Trouble about material things. Labour, toil, land cultivation; building, knowledge and acuteness of earthly things, poverty, carefulness, kindness; sometimes money regained after severe toil and labour. Unimaginative, harsh, stern, determined, obstinate. Geburah of HB:H (Loss of profession, loss of money, monetary anxiety). Herein the angels HB:MBHYH and HB:PNYAL rule.
Etteilla
Lover Upright. This card, as far as the medicine of the spirit is concerned, means, in its natural position: Lover [man], Lover [woman], In love, Gallant man, Gallant woman, Husband, Wife, Groom, Bride, Friend, Friend. – Lover. – Loving, Lovingly, Adoring. – Harmony, Agreement, Convenience, Concordance, Good manners. Reversed. Disorderly, Contrary to order. – Debauchery, Disorder, Turmoil, Confusion, Chaos. – Damage, Devastation, Ruin. – Dissipation, Consumption. – Unruliness, Libertinism. – Discord, Disharmony, Discordance.
Fludd explains how a full geomantic shield is derived from the initial four mothers.
Of the Production of the Other Figures in the Geomantic Shield
It must be noted that from the said mothers,1 who constitute the first four figures of the geomantic shield, four daughters, constituting the fifth, sixth, seventh and eighth figures, arise, taking separately the parts of all the mothers. In the previous example we take from the first figure / . / from the second / . . / from the third / . / from the fourth / . . / And thus these four parts, joined together, generate the first daughter occupying the fifth house, namely, the figure called Amissio. From the mothers’ shoulders the second daughter is born occupying the sixth house, from the legs the third, from the feet the fourth.
But first the niece is derived from the two first mothers, for her head is fused from their two heads, etc. And this is a general rule: that where two heads, shoulders, legs, or feet joined together produce an odd number, namely three, they produce a single; but when they are even, they produce two points. For example: since we find only three points in the aforesaid heads of the first and second mothers, we therefore express the head of the first niece who occupies the ninth house with a single point.
In the same way, since the mothers’ shoulders produce an equal number, therefore also the shoulders of the first niece will consist of two points. Equally, her legs must also be composed of the same number of points, and her feet will have only one point for the above reason. For this reason also, the second niece is fused from the third and fourth mother; the third niece from the first and second daughter, and the fourth and last from the two and last daughters.
In the same way, two Witnesses are produced from four nieces, just as a Judge is produced from two Witnesses. Finally, the sixteenth, the last figure in which the whole shield is summarized, is made up of the Judge and the first mother. And in this manner the whole geomantic shield and its houses must be filled, from which the judgment in this art is to be taken.
A geomantic shield, from Robert Fludd’s Geomancy handbook
Footnotes
Referring to Book I, Part 3. This section requires no commentary, as it describes the usual technique of deriving the full shield from the initial four figures. ↩︎
One pro of using more than one system of divination is that sometimes they clarify each other: sometimes one reading is somewhat obscure in one system but clear in the other, and we can use the clear one to navigate the one that has us scratching our heads. Granted, obscurity is in the eye of the beholder, being always a consequence of our own limitations, but it is still an occasion to learn.
I was at the airport yesterday, trying to catch a flight to get back home. Suddenly, and to my horror, I noticed that plenty of flights were being cancelled due to the heavy mist, including one flight on the same route I needed. My first instinct was to cast a Horary chart, asking if I’d be able to get back home.
Will my flight go as planned or will it be cancelled? Horary Astrology
This was my first interpretation. I am represented by Venus, ruler of the ascendant. The place I want to get is my home, which is ruled by the Fourth House and therefore by the Moon (Cancer is on the cusp). The Moon is approaching an opposition of Venus. Bam! The flight will be cancelled.
After a while, as I was waiting for information, I did a Geomancy reading on the same question. Here is the chart:
Will the flight go as planned or will it be cancelled? App used: Simple Geomancy
The first thing the struck me is the generally positive Judge, Conjunctio, which arises from Carcer and Via. It argues mobility more than stasis, and obstacles that are removed. The second important point is the figure that represents me: Laetitia in the first. Laetitia represents upward motion. It is an exiting figure, meaning movement. What a wonderful symbol for a plane taking off!
Even if we want to involve the Fourth house, we see that it is occupied by Puella, a mildly benefic figure, which is also connected to the ninth house of journeys (it occupies it). So the journey (Ninth) connects with the home (Fourth).
Obviously,two systems of divination cannot give contradictory answers if correctly interpreted, and the Geomancy seemed rather obviously positive. So I went back to the Horary Chart (again below)
Will my flight go as planned or will it be cancelled? Horary Astrology
I meditated on this chart quite a while (I had plenty of time, after all). Then it hit me. I am represented by Venus. Venus is in the Midheaven (up in the sky) in Aquarius, an *air* sign. Not only, but Aquarius is fixed: it doesn’t change. My being in the sky is fixed. So there will be a flight: I will be up in the sky as planned.
But what about that opposition by the Moon? Well, there was significant delay, so the Moon could show the flow of events causing trouble to my being up in the air.
Ultimately, the Fourth House didn’t need to get involved. The point of the question was not whether I would get home (I would have gotten home anyway at some point) but what would happen to me/my flight.
As you may have read in another post, I recently lost my dad. My mother has always been the worrier type, and taking care of him in this last period has exacerbated these traits. I’ve seen her not just depressed, which would be normal, but utterly confused. A couple of days ago, when I discovered my dad’s playing cards, I asked how her mental state would evolve, and if it would improve (I used this picture as header pic of that post):
Will her mental state improve?
There are two points in this spread that immediately jumped at me:
The Two of Diamonds (2♦️) followed by the Four of Spades (4♠️). The Two is a card of communications, especially written, but it is also strongly connected with attitudes, mental states etc. Followed by the Four of Spades, it gives a critical point in her inner life.
The Five of Diamonds (5♦️) squished between Spades. The Five of Diamonds indicates change, transformation, the ability to move on from one state to another. This ability is negated by the surrounding spades.
Clearly she has entered a rather dark tunnel. The following cards offer hope: the Two of Hearts with a Heart court card indicates someone close to us. It could be me, it could be my uncle. The fact that two hearts follow the Spades indicates healing. It may indicate that focusing on the family, especially me, is a source of positivity for her. It could show help from me and my uncle or other close male relatives and friends
The final two cards are the Six of Clubs and the Six of Hearts are interesting. If the 6♣️ hadn’t been present, the three consecutive Hearts would have shown full recovery from the problem. Tbe 6♣️ though, is a card of fatigue, tiredness and of things slowing down, and of problems that seemed solved resurfacing.
Therefore, as may be expected, while the 6♥️ promises improvement, the 6♣️ shows relapses and that scars will remain. I expected no less.
I’ve been helping my mom taking care of my dad’s affairs in the past few days. One thing that surprised us both is how bureaucratized death is. A pleasant surprise, on the other hand, has come in the form of my dad’s playing cards.
They are somewhat old, but it doesn’t show since they were rarely used, still they have the nice papery texture of old playing cards.
I’ve also found some interesting notes from back when I was learning to read them. I’ll be updating the playing card section when I’m back.
(Note: this is a collection of the meanings attributed to the cards by some occultists in the past centuries. It does not reflect my own study or opinion of the cards. It is only meant as a quick comparative reference as I develop my own take.)
The Five of Swords from the Builders of the Adytum (BOTA) tarot deck
Paul Foster Case (and Ann Davies)
The time period is the first decanate of Aquarius, from January 20 to 29, under the rulers hip of Saturn and Uranus. Well-Dignified: the decision is adve rse to the Querent in any matter of a material nature. In spiritual affairs this card portends apparent troubles which work out ultimately to good result. Thus this Key is one of trouble and anxiety, but rightly comprehended can be the turning point for positive good . Ill-Dignified: the troubles are intensified and are probably due to the Querent’s own lack of understanding of the true nature of the situation. If the question is one of speculation, the Querent is likely to be disappointed due to his own desire to get something for nothing, to over-reach somebody else, or to get rich quick. Keyword: Defeat. (From the Oracle of Tarot Course)
A. E. Waite
A disdainful man looks after two retreating and dejected figures. Their swords lie upon the ground. He carries two others on his left shoulder, and a third sword is in his right hand, point to earth. He is the master in possession of the field. Divinatory Meanings: Degradation, destruction, revocation, infamy, dishonour, loss, with the variants and analogues of these. Reversed: The same; burial and obsequies. (From The Pictorial Key to the Tarot)
Aleister Crowley
The Five of Swords is similarly [to the other fives] troublesome; the card is called Defeat. There has been insufficient power to maintain the armed peace of the Four. The quarrel has actually broken out. This must mean defeat, for the original idea of the Sword was a manifestation of the result of the love between the Wand and the Cup. It is because the birth had to express itself in the duality of the Sword and the Disk that the nature of each appears so imperfect.
[…]
Geburah, as always, produces disruption; but as Venus here rules Aquarius, weakness rather than excess of strength seems the cause of disaster. The intellect has been enfeebled by sentiment. The defeat is due to pacifism. Treachery also may be implied.
The hilts of the swords form the inverted pentagram, always a symbol of somewhat sinister tendency. Here matters are even worse; none of the hilts resembles any of the others, and their blades are crooked or broken. They give the impression of drooping; only the lowest of the swords points upwards, and this is the least effective of the weapons. The rose of the previous card has been altogether disintegrated.
The historian is happy to observe two perfect illustrations of the mode of this card and the last in the birth of the Aeon of (1) Osiris, (2) Horus. He will note the decay of such Virtue as characterized Sparta and Rome, ending in the establishment of the Pax Romana. As Virtue declined, corruption disintegrated the Empire from within. Epicene cults, such as those of Dionysus (in its degraded form), of Attis, of Adonis, of Cybele, the false Demeter and the prostituted Isis, replaced the sterner rites of the true Solar-Phallic gods; until finally (the masters having lost the respect, and so the control, of the plebs, native and alien) the lowest of all the slave-cults, dressed up in the fables of the vilest of the parasitic races, swept over the known world, and drenched it in foul darkness for five hundred years. He will delight to draw close parallels with the cognate phenomena displayed before the present generation. (From The Book of Thoth)
AI-generated illustration for the Five of Swords
Golden Dawn’s Book T
TWO Rayed Angelic Hands each holding two swords nearly upright, but falling apart of each other, right and left of the card. A third hand holds a sword upright in the centre as though it had disunited them. The petals of the rose, which in the four had been reinstated in the centre, are torn asunder and falling. Above and below are Venus and Aquarius for Decan.
Contest finished and decided against the person; failure, defeat, anxiety, trouble, poverty, avarice, grieving after gain, laborious, unresting; loss and vileness of nature; malicious, slanderous, lying, spiteful and tale-bearing. A busybody and separator of friends, hating to see peace and love between others. Cruel, yet cowardly, thankless and unreliable. Clever and quick in thought and speech. Feelings of pity easily roused, but unenduring.
Geburah of HB:V (Defeat, loss, malice, spite, slander, evil-speaking). Herein the Angels HB:ANYAL and HB:Cha’aMYH bear rule.
Etteilla
Loss Upright. This card, as far as the medicine of the spirit is concerned, means, in its natural position: Loss, Alteration, Discredit, Degradation, Perdition, Decay, Destruction, Deterioration, Deterioration, Diminution, Depression, Diminution, Damage, Failure, Prejudice, Blemish, Torts, Avarice, Decline of business, Failure, Disadvantage, Devastation, Dilapidation, Dissipation, Injury, Disgrace, Reversal, Reversal of fortune, Ruin. – Defeat – Debauchery, Disgrace, Dishonor, Infamy, Ignominy, Affront, Ugliness, Difformity, Humiliation. – Theft, Thievery, Rape, Plagiarism, Abduction, Filthy, Horrible. – Infamy, Corruption, Profligacy, Seduction, Libertinism. Reversed. Mourning, Abasement, Affliction, Sadness, Grief, Pain of spirit, Funeral pump, Burial, Funeral, Inhumation, Burial.
No matter what kind of divination we practice: if it’s worth its salt and is not just some feelgood angel therapy oracle, it has the potential to deliver bad news. How we handle bad news is a mark of how helpful we are capable of being as diviners.
People can come to us for a variety of reason. They may need reassurance, hope, advice or just a quick look ahead. They may even come to us for fun or curiosity, and as long as they are not disrespectful, there is nothing wrong in indulging them.
The principle of respect for our querent stems from seeing them as a whole person rather than a sack of meat endowed with more than its fair share of doubts. We, as diviners and as handlers of odd devices (decks, charts, counters of various kinds) hold a degree of power over them. It is symbolic power, for sure, but reality itself is symbolic (that’s how magic works), therefore symbolic power is real power, and must not be misused.
Finding the right balance between informing the querent and respecting them can be difficult. It’s all well and good as long as the cards talk about pleasant trips and job interviews. But occasionally we recognize messages that we know are going to deeply upset our querent.
Causing unnecessary anguish is a no-no, and there are things that cannot be said without causing unnecessary anguish (“You’ll die soon”, “You’ll lose the baby). Even less serious topics (at least, less serious than death), such as marital infidelity must be treated with caution. We cannot just destroy whole families willy-nilly simply because our cards seem to hint at untoward dealings.
We must also distinguish whether a querent directly asks for something or something unpleasant simply shows up in the cards. Usually, if the querent asks for something, we can be more forthcoming, if we can speak with tact. If they ask “Will I get the job?”, they need to be able to accept “I’m not infallible, but it seems they appear more inclined to go with someone else.”
If they ask “Is my spouse faithful?” and the cards show clear signs of interference, an answer like “Remember that I could be wrong, but there does seem to be someone who’s trying whisk them away from you. Maybe it’s time to have an honest talk and try to solve the issue.”
Incredibly enough, even some taboo topics may occasionally be addressed in this guise. For instance, there are plenty of non-morbid reasons querents might want to know about death: “Do you think my elderly father going to survive long? I want to be able to visit him one last time but the situation at home is just crazy.”
While we must not delude the querent, we have no right to rob them of all hope. Aside from the mantra “Remember I’m a fallible human being”, and even aside from potential advice we might sometime give the querent to soften the blows of bad luck, there are occasionally ways of preparing the querent for a difficult situation without hurting them.
“Is the pregnancy going to go alright?” This is a question I am become more and more skeptical of answering as time goes by, because there is no way of saying anything other than “yes” and still be able to look at myself in the mirror. If we do find ourselves somehow coerced into answering it and the cards are less than positive, the only thing we may say is something to the effect of “Yes, but remember to take it easy, and the cards are saying you should pay extra attention to the doctor’s orders.”
Where all else fails, human empathy is our last line of defense. Helping the querent even for just some minutes by sharing their burden is part of what we may have to sign up for when we choose the path of divination.
