Different decks = different meanings??

Thread originally posted on the Aeclectic Tarot Forum on 07 May 2002, and now archived in the Forum Library.

Jezibelle	07 May 2002
I have a few decks like most people. But I also have a favorite deck that I tend to use more than the others. Its the Dragon deck, I am drawn to the artwork on it and it just feels right in my hands. Now the question. When you do a reading with a different deck, Do you tend to draw your meanings from what you know of that deck or do you go to what you learned from. In my case Rider-Waite. Jez

Aerin	07 May 2002
I do a bit of both. I tend to think of the different interpretations of the same card as different perspectives on the same (very complex) thing. Like when you have a three dimensional object, if you shine a torch on it from different directions then you get a differently shaped shadow. But they are still shadows of the same object, even though superficially they may look very different and the author of the deck may have written down an interpretation taking an alternative slant on a card from one I am used to. A good example is the Mind court cards in the Osho Zen - the meanings are very negative, as if the cards are reversed versions of the ones I am more familiar with. Aerin

Lion-O	07 May 2002
Quote: Originally posted by Jezibelle When you do a reading with a different deck, Do you tend to draw your meanings from what you know of that deck or do you go to what you learned from. In my case Rider-Waite. It heavily depends on my mood and the way I'm reading the cards. The decks I have are in a lot of ways equal where the meanings of the cards are concerned, its just the drawings which differ a lot. So in that aspect I don't have much trouble to distinguish between the seperate cards in a reading. Still, there are a few different ways I'm using to read the cards... Although I tend to simply take the meaning of the cards into consideration most of the time I sometimes also totally focus on the drawings and simply try to grasp the meaning of the picture. And in those cases it can happen that "equal" cards from both decks can have a different meaning to me. I'll try to give you a 'life' example... When you take a look at this URL: http://www.aeclectic.net/tarot/mage/index.html you will see the 'Queen of Dynamism' in the upper left corner. The Dynamism suit in the Mage deck is equal to the Swords in Rider Waite. Now when you look at the Queen of Swords: http://www.learntarot.com/sqn.htm you will see what I mean (I think, although I can think of better examples I have some trouble finding pictures of the Mage deck online). My interpretation (which also varies) is that the Queen of Dynamism is sad. She looks very sad and confused and stares at the floating dagger/sword while her minions (in the front) cry out for reasons unknown to me. IMO its obvious that there is quite some misery in this picture which I interpret as facing the (miserable) facts, knowing you should/will face the truth no matter how unpleasant and finally also taking a devious way to plot other (hideous?) ways so solve the matter(s) at hand. OTOH when I take a look at the Rider deck I see a very stern woman holding her sword and waving to her minions. She has set her mind onto action and will do whatever it takes to reach her goal in a fair, decent but most of all honorable way. The bird in the background added to the clouds shows me (the clouds are something which I also tend to interpet in more then one way) that a storm is brewing. It might even be the enemy which is marching and is right now heading for our beloved queen and her people. Basicly I see valor here, wisdom and most of all determination. Not to mention the problems ahead which are to be delt with. So I guess I do a bit of everything, although following the (defined) meanings of the cards is a very safe way to do a reading IMO. Once you mastered that you can (more) easily take the next step. Well, I hope this is a bit usefull.

Shadow_Dragon	08 May 2002
Just like you I use the Dragon Tarot because the pictures are full of beauty and meaning, which is why I can read them, and of course you know that the deck comes with a book. I ignore that book with a cold heart because after I studied the cards for a couple of months... I've learned that the cards have a bigger meaning then what the book has to say. Come up with your own meaning... what do the cards mean to you? What do they say to you? Listen and learn. The meanings will come to you. If you must work on one card at a time, and after studying them for a while, the deck and you will have a very strong bond. At least that's how things have worked out with me.

Zhritza	09 May 2002
For the first several years that I did tarot, I had to rely heavily on the meanings of the minors from my first deck, the Medieval Scapini, in order to read with any other deck. Frequently I had to call up an image of the Scapini or Robin Wood card in my mind to even begin to interpret the card in front of me. It's fortunate for me that those decks are pretty RWS-based (albeit with a few digressions). It seems that most cards in the minor arcana have two or three basic meanings or small sets of meanings associated with them in all my decks. Sometimes it's as simple as determining whether the artist is alluding to the RWS meaning or the Thoth meaning; for instance, one of my favorite cards, the Six of Swords, has the "Science" meaning in Thoth (which I'm still wrangling with), whereas in the RWS it implies a literal or metaphorical journey, frequently out of unfavorable conditions and into better ones. However, I have some decks that do a lovely job of including multiple possibilities in their imagery without being too cluttered. The Light and Shadow Tarot has a sailor navigating with a compass for this card, joining the "journey" and "science" meanings. The Victoria Regina goes more for the "science" version, but the card has a distinct feeling of motion and progress to it. But in general, when I know of more than one meaning for a card, I'll pick the one I feel the most comfortable with (which is almost always the one from Robin Wood, not Scapini, for some reason) unless the card from the deck I'm using at the moment is really vivid in another direction. I am not familiar with any really divergent meanings for the major arcana in the decks that I use. I know that several tarot artists have recast the Devil card and made him a Pan/Dionysus-type figure. This would really, really throw me. I'm sort of a wimp about variation in the majors' meanings.

MeeWah	09 May 2002
I have no hard & fast "rule"; tend to play it according to the moment of the reading. Sometimes it is a blend of what I know of the card from different decks & the usual--the surrounding cards. With radically different decks such as The Vertigo, it calls for a different approach--by reason of the artist's view. I also see it as a "shadow" deck so I adjust accordingly.

The Different decks = different meanings?? thread was originally posted on 07 May 2002 in the Talking Tarot board, and is now archived in the Forum Library. Read the active threads in Talking Tarot, or read more archived threads.