(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.)
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)
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.
MQS
