Tarot and the Tree of Life

by Isabel Radow Kliegman

  Imagine, or better, remember being five years old. We can’t reach the light switch, we can’t read a storybook or a clock face, we can’t tell a dime from a nickel (“dinkle” was my daughter’s guess), and buttons seem to have even less to do with buttonholes than the shape of our socks have to do with the shape of our toes. Left shoes seem to gravitate to right feet; shoelaces require the dexterity of a violin virtuoso, and “lost” means around the corner or seven houses down the street. We don’t have the words for most of what we feel, but being taken care of is what we need most, even if we can’t say it.

  Children consistently feel guilty and shamed by their abuse; believing themselves responsible gives them some sense of power or choice, even if it intensifies their pain. And it is less threatening to believe themselves deserving of abuse than to believe a parent, on whom they are totally dependent, to be untrustworthy and cruel. The figure in the Nine of Wands can be seen as defending the very source of his suffering, even as he stiffens against it. By extension of meaning, the abuse may be physically violent or verbally undermining, but the possibility of sexual abuse is always present with the appearance of this card, particularly if it is reversed.

  Finally, if we return to the notion of Wands as carrying intuition, the Nine of Wands can represent comparable damage to the child’s magical, creative, psychic function. In patriarchal societies, we tend to be rewarded and congratulated for quantifiable success—mastery of the alphabet, correct answers to arithmetical problems, good marks in school. Our fantasies, imaginings, inklings, and artistic expressions are more likely to be dismissed as foolish and pointless, or even as naughty lies. In that case the card represents protecting intuition in the face of past assaults that we have every reason to suspect will continue.

  Here we see the first separation card of the Suit of Wands, and the meaning, though complex, is clear. We have been separated from our own intuition and therefore from ourselves. No wonder we are suspicious, watchful, and uneasy. If we have been convinced that we can’t trust our intuition, where are we to turn? If we have been convinced that we don’t know what we know, what can we trust? If we see and sense animosity between parents, sexuality between an older sister and her boyfriend, or anxiety about a brother’s health or a father’s employment, we know. To be reassured that we are only imagining things, or accused of making up stories, looking for trouble, or stirring up nonsense puts our trust in our deepest selves at odds with our faith in the people on whom we are most dependent. Separated from his own intuition, the figure in the Nine of Wands regards his own wands with suspicion.

  It is clear that the image of the Nine of Wands is an appropriate one for Yesod, the foundation, and the vagaries of moonlight. What the various interpretations of the card share is their grounding in unconscious issues. What we manifest in Malchut will depend on how we deal with these issues in Yesod; our extroverted behavior is indeed based on how we process our childhood wounds.

  Ten of Wands

  Looking at the Ten of Wands, we can see clearly that the Wands have become increasingly burdened as they move down to Malchut. Here is a figure carrying ten wands before him, bent with the effort and unable to see past his bundle to his destination—perhaps the house at the back of the card. We observe here the reverse effect from the one we saw in the Two of Pentacles. Pentacles, being earthy, are off balance in Chochma, in the rarefied realm of emanation. Conversely, the fieriness of Wands makes them uncomfortable in the kingdom where energy must be solid.

  The Ten of Wands is a simple card. Insofar as Wands represent intuitive, creative energy, they require a mode of expression. The energies of Wands must be integrated with other suits to make this expression possible. Without it, they become an unwelcome weight.

  It is not the proper use of intuition to let it accumulate. We are meant to make use of it, bring it to harvest. When that doesn’t happen, when the creative process is dammed up, it becomes an encumbrance. Wands need the powerful feeling of Cups to motivate follow-through, the rigors of Swords to organize inklings into thoughts, and the earthiness of Pentacles to bring them into the material world. When we fall short of the courage or clarity to bring our creativity into full manifestation, inspiration becomes a burden. We would just as soon not have it at all.

  Perhaps the most common presenting problem of my clientele is, “I know I’m supposed to be doing something else—I have all these feelings that I can’t express, but I know they’re important. How can I find out what I should be doing with them?” The Ten of Wands is the card for having received much, psychically and spiritually, being affluent in gifts for which we have not yet found direction. The pain of this search is very great; John Milton refers to his poetry as “that one talent, which is death to hide.” Holding back our generative capabilities is indeed a kind of death to the psyche.

  Specifically, the Ten of Wands represents the writer’s block that keeps us staring at a blank page, the stage fright that keeps a talented performer in the wings, and so forth. But we must remember, as always when dealing with Wands, that they also carry explicitly sexual energy. If the Eight suggests sexual climax, the Ten must convey celibacy, the holding back of libido. When the card is reversed, there can be the suggestion of sexual frustration, either in celibacy or in unsatisfactory relations.

  Wands, the suit of fire, embody the most rarefied of our energies. Their natural tendency is to reach higher, climb to loftier realms. In fact, after years of working uneasily with the Ten of Wands, I realized what was tweaking at my own intuition, which led to a clearer understanding of the card. What was troubling me was the body language of the figure, the angle of his body as he carries his load. I defy any reader to lift, let alone carry, a heavy load in this way. It is, I then realized, just how you would carry an armful of helium balloons! The figure is not lifting the wands, he is holding them down. The difficulty consists in holding back what is, by nature, meant to fly.

  Wands need to be balanced by the grounding effect of Pentacles and are not themselves easy at the more mundane sefirot of the Kabbalistic Tree. Here in Malchut, the Earth itself, the problem of the Ten is expressed and exacerbated by its being a separation card. Malchut is associated with the soles of the feet, and the figure is indeed on the move, pushing forward on his own two feet. However, he is separated from his own creative expression. We see in him someone who literally can’t see the forest for the trees. Getting to the house, not dropping a single wand, seems more important to him than allowing his intuition to fly, trusting his creative thrust to carry them aloft, making manifest his inspiration.

  With this examination of Wands, we conclude our discussion of the suits of the Minor Arcana and their relation to the pillars and the sefirot of the Kabbalistic Tree. Our study in balance and integration will continue as we consider the court cards of all four suits, conceiving of the Tree in terms of its olams.

  CHAPTER 7

  Court Cards: Our Many Selves

  IN EXPLORING the numbered cards of the Minor Arcana, we have related each to its respective sefirah on the Tree of Life, weaving our way among its pillars.

  In examining the court cards, we approach the Tree in terms of its horizontal divisions, its four olams or realms. Three of these are described by three sefirot each, which form triangles. The first, composed of Keter, Chochma, and Binah, forms an upward-pointing triangle called a fire triangle, since it is the nature of fire to move up. The second, composed of Chesed, Gevurah, and Tiferet, forms a downward-pointing triangle, a water triangle, since water moves down, seeking its own level. The third, composed of Netzach, Hod, and Yesod, also forms a downward-pointing water triangle. The final olam, as you may recall, consists of the single sefirah of Malchut that, being the earth plane, of course represents the “element” of earth.

  There are those who would like to say that either the second or third triangle must be an air triangle, and it is certainly tempting to take this position. Air is the fourth “element”; completion and symmetry seem to demand it
s presence. There is only one problem with adopting this view, and that is that there is no justification for it. Air does not always move down! The position—as I see it—is therefore reductionistic.

  What we are left with then is the question, “How can the Tree of Life, microcosm of the macrocosm, have no olam of air?” I have no answer to that question, but I do have a perspective on questions themselves that is shared by Zen and Chasidic traditions.

  A devoted and driven seeker of truth travels for many months to the house of a great master, one who reputedly has The Answer. When he finally arrives, he is denied an audience and subjected to jeers of the many who have preceded him, knowing that the master has kept his solitude unbroken for twenty years. But our hero is not to be deterred. He waits until everyone has fallen asleep and steals into the master’s chamber.

  The master looks up and demands, “What do you want?” “I have a most important question,” replies the seeker. “Tell me, Master, what is truth?” The master’s response is a slap across the face! Stunned and hurt, the petitioner cries, “Master, my question is sincere and selfless! Why did you strike me?” The master’s response is a second slap, after which the seeker is pushed out of the chamber, the door resoundingly slammed behind him.

  At this point the young stranger finds a bar, but his attempts to console himself with brew fail so obviously that a town elder approaches him to question the source of his distress. Upon hearing the young man’s plight, he begins to pace, tugging at his beard and musing. Suddenly his eyes light up in delight and his wise old face crinkles into a smile of understanding. “It is clear that the master slapped your face the first time to teach you something very important: that questions are better than answers. It was his way of saying, ‘That is a good question! How can you be such a fool as to believe you need an answer to it?’ Now I realize why he slapped you a second time. It was to teach you something even more important. He was showing you that there is never any connection between a question and an answer!”

  This parable itself leaves us with a question. Certainly on a literal level there usually is a relationship between what is asked and what is answered. The first hard knock we have to accept, however, is that while answers are more gratifying than questions (at least on an immediate basis), questions are more valuable. Questions open lines of thought, discussion, and possibility, while answers close them off. Exploration depends on questions; answers spell the death of imagination, hypothesis, and wonder; as long as we “knew” that Earth was the center of the universe, astronomy as a science was shut down.

  The second blow we need to accept is that when we go beyond the mundane “What time is it?” order of questioning to questions that genuinely open our minds, the answers that come to us may bear little logical connection to the original inquiry. Instead, we are led to areas of reflection, memory, and speculation beyond our mental awareness at the time the question was posed.

  Reductionistic thinking would attribute air to one of the olams of the Kabbalistic Tree to tie things up neatly and provide an answer. The question “How can the ‘element’ of air not be represented along with fire, water, and earth on the Tree of Life?” leaves us uncomfortable and bewildered. Given this choice, I would opt to stay with discomfort, leaving the matter open for future discovery. More on this subject follows shortly.

  The topmost of the olams, Atzilut, is the realm of emanation. It is into this realm that the divine essence, God energy, has radiated from the Ein (the One) through the Ein Sof (limitlessness) to the Ein Sof Ohr (limitless light) and into the Tree itself at Keter, the first sefirah of this supernal triangle.

  The second of these triangles, the first downward-pointing triangle, is Beriah, the world of creation. The third olam, the second downward-pointing triangle, is Yetzirah, the universe of formation. Clearly, as we move down the Tree, the olams grow more specific and manifest. Finally we arrive at Assiyah, the olam that is composed of the single sefirah of Malchut, the realm of action.

  What are the correspondences between these four olams and the four court cards? Traditionally, the olam of emanation, Atzilut, belongs to the kings, because the kings are the most highly evolved of the court cards. They are the final expression of the energy of their suit and so claim the loftiest realm of the Tree for themselves. To the realm of Beriah, creation, is assigned the queens. To the realm of Yetzirah, formation, the knights are assigned. So far this system works. Creation is what we women do; we bring the babies into the world. And young men set out to make their mark in the world, give form to chaos and change the formation of things—governments, belief systems, and so on. In Assiyah, the olam of action, we have the pages, the least developed of the court cards, falling to the earthiest of the worlds.

  The system delineated has much to commend it, yet the more I thought about it, the less satisfactory it seemed. The reasons were three, the first being simply visual. The aces of each suit depict an oversized hand, which can be only the hand of God, coming out of the heavens through a cloud, offering a gift. Which of the court cards appear to have just received these gifts? Look at the cards. There is something in the demeanor and the posture of the pages that powerfully suggests to me just having received something brand new.

  The second question I raise in relation to the traditional system is that Malchut is called “the kingdom.” Sounds like a good place for kings to me! Where could the king belong if not in the kingdom, and who but the king could rule there?

  My most crucial concern with the system, however, is that the work of the world needs to be done, not by the youngest and least experienced of the court cards, but by the wisest and most fully developed. If the first nine sefirot can be thought of as the gestation period, anything that does not reach Malchut, anything that does not reach manifestation, is stillborn. Who can say what has been lost when a baby is stillborn? It might have been the next Mozart, John Kennedy, or Gandhi. All we know is that here in the world nothing has been accomplished, nobody benefits, nothing has been expressed. If the king is the fulfillment of the suit, he belongs in the olam that is the fulfillment of the Tree.

  For these reasons I believe that development moves down the Tree from the pages to the kings. For years, I was tempted to keep the queens in Beriah and the knights in Yetzirah because it felt intuitively correct. This of course leads to an interesting problem: the normal court card progression of page, knight, queen, king is disrupted. The sequence with which I was left was page, queen, knight, king. Even though this system intuitively seemed more fitting, I was tempted to throw it out on the grounds that it couldn’t be right.

  As I have already suggested, however, I am of the tradition that holds a good question to be more valuable than a good answer—and certainly preferable to an unsatisfactory answer based on rigid or simplistic thinking. So I left open the question, “How can the natural progression of the court cards be disturbed if they are being properly assigned to the olams of the Tree?”

  Recently, this question was answered to my satisfaction. The suggestion was made that the queens could easily belong to the universe of formation and the knights to the universe of creation. If we stay with the paradigm of birth, it can be perceived that creation occurs at the moment of conception. The knights on horseback represent the movement of the sperm to the ova. The queens can then be seen to reside in the realm of formation where, over a nine-month period, they give form to the potential of the egg, making a baby from a single fertilized cell. For those of us comfortable with that scheme, the natural order of the court cards is then restored: page, knight, queen, and king, moving from Atzilut to Assiyah.

  A teacher or book can suggest a direction for the student of Tarot, but finally each reader—man or woman—is the High Priestess of this study. Your own intuition is your own highest authority and can never be overridden. What follows is my own highly opinionated, intensely felt, not necessarily correct, and perhaps at times alienating view of who these court cards are and what they mean. My biases will become ve
ry clear, and ideally yours will as well.

  Before you read any further, I suggest the following as a useful exercise: Take all of the court cards, spread them out in front of you, and look at the array of humankind represented. Ask yourself, “If I could choose only one of these sixteen cards for a friend, which would I choose and why? If I had to choose one of these cards as a business partner, who would it be? If I could have had any mother I wanted, which of these queens would I have chosen for my mother? Which figure would I avoid at all costs as being totally irresponsible and someone whose word wouldn’t mean anything at all to me?”

  Think about the things that are important to you in your friends and family in your values. Ask yourself, “Who’s representing what here? Who’s got the best sense of humor? Who’s the most charming? Who’s the most serious? Is there anybody here who looks a little depressed? Who’s the most combative, competitive? Who’s the most remote? Who would have made the worst father?” It will be amazing, if you spend time with the cards, what will come through for you! That’s a promise.

  A final suggestion: when you find cards with which you sense an immediate rapport, put them away and work with the other ones! The ones that elicit a feeling of connection are talking to you loud and clear without much attention. Working with the cards you don’t especially take to or understand will yield the richest benefits.

  The Pages

  Let us begin in Atzilut, the realm of emanation, where the pages receive their gifts from the aces. The pages are the children or adolescents of the Tarot. They have all the virtues of youth—openness, energy, lack of preconception, optimism, faith, enthusiasm, innocence, and idealism. They are, unfortunately, totally lacking in the gifts of age—experience and wisdom. They are more passionate than informed.