Curious Morgan-Greer symbolism

Thread originally posted on the Aeclectic Tarot Forum on 01 Dec 2003, and now archived in the Forum Library.

philsgrl	01 Dec 2003
Hi all! I have had my Morgan-Greer deck for only a couple of weeks, but was wondering if any of you could offer some insight into some of the symbolism a few of the cards have that I'm not sure about. I read the thread Emily started that brought up quite a bit of insight into MG, but am wondering what the blue fly on the Devil card could be. Also, its obvious that the two blue gloved hands are the merchant's, but whose is the third brown gloved hand? The one holding the other wand? ~Rebecca

philsgrl	01 Dec 2003
That last card was the two of wands. ~R

Jewel-ry	01 Dec 2003
Hi philsgrl, Dont know who the other hand belongs to in two wands but whenever I see the blue gloves I think of handling a situation with kid gloves, ie delicately dont know why but thats what I see. J :)

Sulis	01 Dec 2003
I wonder about the bluebottle on the Devil card and the other hand in the 2 wands as well. That devil card really is strange isn't it. Emily mentioned in another thread that she's been using a dictionary of tarot symbols. Emily, what book have you been using? I've been looking for a book on symbolism but don't know where to start. Love and light Sulis xx Edited to add: Just done a search and realised that 'The Tarot companion' by Tracy Porter has a symbol dictionary in it and it's already on my Yule wishlist. xx

Mimers	01 Dec 2003
Hi everyone, I don't have this deck, but I have the book, Spiritual Tarot, 78 Paths to Personal Development by Signe E Ecols, Robert Mueller, and Sandra A Thomson. It discusses the meanings of each card, and uses 3 decks as examples: RW, MG and Aquarian. It touches on the symbolism in each of these decks. It is a great book, especially if you own one of these decks. About the blue fly in the Devil it reads: "The blue fly inside the large inverted yellow pentagram on the Morgan-Greer cared represents the negative noise in our heads that distracts us from creative endevors." In Sandra A. Thomson's book, Pictures of the Heart, A Tarot Dictionary (another worthwhile book) it states this as the color blue which does make sence as the color for the fly. "...blue can symbolize unconscious processes at work, emotions, ideas flowing from the unconscious, intuition, and the process of reflection." About the extra hand in the 2 of Wands: "This card speaks of choices and potential new partnerships, so aptly represented by the hand of an unseen person in the lower left corner of the card." hope this helps! Mimi

Jewel-ry	01 Dec 2003
Thanks Mimers, Another couple of books on my xmas wish list..... J :)

Le_Corsair	01 Dec 2003
In The Book of Tarot by Susan Gerulskis-Estes, the fly on the Devil's head is "...symbolic of the Devil's incessantly evil nature..." And if memory serves, one of the Devil's traditional subsidiary titles is "Lord of the Flies." Bob :THERM

Emily	01 Dec 2003
Hi Sulis, I did a search on google for tarot symbols and it bought a few good websites up, also the learn tarot book by Sylvia Abraham has a small symbol dictionary in the back of it. I'm trying to remember which of my other books do too, I didn't even know that symbol dictionaries were in the back pages lol. I'll have a look at my other books and post back. :)

Sulis	01 Dec 2003
Thanks for the book recommendations Mimi. I've been wondering about 'Spiritual Tarot', the other one sounds like it's just the sort of thing I'm looking for too. Looks like I'll be getting books for Yule this year :) Emily thanks for suggesting Google -wish I'd thought of that;) Love and light Sulis xx

philsgrl	02 Dec 2003
Hey thanks for the insight everyone! I kind of thought that maybe the third hand would be a partnership of some sort, business maybe. since in the RW deck the merchant is waiting for his trade ships to come in. The devil card is a little strange! The eyes are chilling, which may be fitting since people are always saying how eyes are "the windows into the soul" or something to that effect. I think before someone thought that maybe any personal, negative reaction to the card should be examined and taken as a fear within. I ordered "Spiritual Tarot" from Amazon a few days ago, the one by multiple authors that supposedly covers the symbolism in the MG. :) ~R

Myrrha	02 Dec 2003
Quote: Originally posted by Mimers [b"the blue fly inside the large inverted yellow pentagram on the morgan-greer cared represents the negative noise in our heads that distracts us from creative endevors."[/b] I like this interpretation, thanks Mimers. Just wanted to add that flys often symbolize decay, the transient nature of phyical existance (as in the flys on fruit in Dutch still life paintings). They can also symbolize what used to be called moral decay as well, or "corruption". The sickly green color of the background also goes with the idea of decay. But is decay always a bad thing? Sometimes situations have to decay or break down in order to be rebuilt in new ways. --Myrrha

WalesWoman	02 Dec 2003
In the Book of Tarot, the companion book that came with my deck, says "the fly is symbolic of the Devil's incessantly evil nature", the burning candle represents individual life as opposed to universal or cosmic life, suggesting his power is limited to influence only the individual lives that fall into his trap. I think of it as the "fly in the ointment", contaminating influences. In the two of Wands the hand belongs to someone offering something to the person holding the globe (world, ideas, energy) perhaps, the rod in this hand is leafy but not as developed at the one the youth holds in his hand. I believe it is about making choices to insure steady progress, to keep working on what he has that is successful or take something else to develop. He isn't satisfied with with the result of his success and is weighing his options. The Book of Tarot Illustrated with the Morgan-Greer Tarot Susan Gerulskis-Estes ISBN 0-88079-277-9 U.S. Games Systems, Inc.

The Curious Morgan-Greer symbolism thread was originally posted on 01 Dec 2003 in the Using Tarot Cards board, and is now archived in the Forum Library. Read the active threads in Using Tarot Cards, or read more archived threads.