Cards which communicate passion?

Thread originally posted on the Aeclectic Tarot Forum on 23 Nov 2004, and now archived in the Forum Library.

noby	23 Nov 2004
On my way back from picking up lunch today, I heard a great song on the radio by Franz Ferdinand called "This Fire," which has the lyrics, "Now there is a fire in me, a fire that burns... This fire is out of control, I'm going to burn this city, burn this city..." It got me thinking about passion, and I started thinking about which cards in the tarot represent this quality. I thought that in general, passion is associated with the element of fire, and this quality is present either overtly or subtly in many cards in the Wands suit. I think there is a quality of passion in the Aces, which show the initial flash of qualities in their purest form... the passion of the soul, of the mind, of the emotions, of the physical realm. I think the Knights and Pages show different kinds of passion, the pages a more inward passion which comes from taking in so much of the world outside, the passion of a student to learn as much as possible, while the Knights show a passion of action and unbridled personality, the passion of an adventurer to experience as much as possible. Specific cards which I think really depict this quality are The World, the refinement of a more contemplative and inner passion and freedom; the Three of Swords, which shows that our experiences of pain and anguish are at the heart of our most passionate feelings; the Page of Pentacles, the passion of being a wide-eyed student of the world; the Four of Wands, the passion of breaking free; the Two of Cups, the passion of new love. I like the contrast between Strength in the RWS and Lust in the Thoth, passion tamed into strength versus letting it all hang out and burning out of control. What cards represent passion to you?

Kissa	24 Nov 2004
Queen of Wands. Entire, passionate woman. Not the kind you don't notice. A hurricane, but a warm hurricane, taking you with her in any project she describes, fascinating. Wants to motivate ppl, extremely energetic, loves to be with ppl, needs to be with ppl. Risk of getting burned out? Too many projests at a time? Too many relationships, not enough depth? But the lady has a cat, right? So she can't be that bad... ;) My two cents. Very very interesting thread btw that shows us once again that we don't just read or study tarot, we live it too, finding it everywhere in our daily lives. Thanks noby! Kissa

Fulgour	24 Nov 2004
Never lose touch with your passion, or decline to carry the full weight of the commitment you have made to your dreams. There's a special quality to the 10 of Wands, a singleness of purpose that only those who truly believe can know. Your intuition may be trying to tell you that the most important answer is the one that concerns your sense of devotion and willingness to endure ~ to attain a personal goal by not giving up on the spiritual desire to really go all the way to the heart of your feelings and earn the kind of personal respect you deserve, a sort of validation for your sense of the meaning and value of love. In the realm of emotions there is no clear way to speak of love as beginning or ending ~ when it is there, and you know you have found it, what does it matter if sometimes it comes a bit closer or when it seems that it goes a little way off just a bit too far? Give to yourself the very thing that you cannot ask of another ~ absolute unconditional love, and then take forward the wondrous burden with no purpose other than to show to all the world that what is, and has been, shall always be, love.

Keslynn	24 Nov 2004
Maybe it's not the kind of passion you were talking about, but I first thought of the Lovers. Depending on the deck, it can be really passionate! At any rate, whether you read it as choice or a hot love affair, it's an earth-shaking and life changing outpouring of yourself. It's taking the ultimate risk of loving and being loved, and that, to me, takes a lot of passion. :) Kes

Alissa	24 Nov 2004
Passionate frenzy... Knight of Swords. Passionate love... 2 of cups. Passionately charismatic... the Magician. Lost in his passions... 7 of cups. Dark passion... the High Priestess.

M-Press	24 Nov 2004
After reading this, i actually thought of the 5 of Cups. The DRAMA is so overwealming, that it becomes passionate... and what about the Tower? and Death? I feel passion there too...;)

ros	24 Nov 2004
Knight of Cups

VGimlet	24 Nov 2004
Also The Devil. I think Kiama was the one who opened my eyes to this one }) There are those (including me) who think the Devil evolved from Bacchus or Pan - the original purveyor of Sex, Drugs and Rock and Roll, LOL.

noby	24 Nov 2004
I love all of these answers and ideas! I agree that each card mentioned thus far communicates its own kind of passion.

Grizabella	25 Nov 2004
What about the 10 Swords? Someone would have to be pretty passionate to put 10 swords in someone's back, I think. Makes me see the 10 of Swords in a different way now.

Fudugazi	25 Nov 2004
Passion runs through the Tarot, from start to finish - even the cards that appear passionless (Temperance, 6 swords) are dealing with passion in one way - Temperance sublimates it, the six of swords offers a quiet passage from one time of passion to the next. If we take the Tarot to be a representation of life, then passion ends with life itself... Here are a few thoughts, among the trumps: The Tower is the card closest to the Franz Ferdinand song that started this thread - "I'm going to burn that city, burn that city..." The Tower burns, the city burns, it is Troy up in flames, Carthage razed to the ground, the Temple in Jerusalem, and Jeremiah passionately lamenting its loss, Rome destroyed, that we still mourn. In the Mythic deck it is Poseidon crashing his storm against a lighthouse, Poseidon who pursued Odysseus with his vengeance for years for the killing of his Cyclop man-eating son. It is also the "coup de foudre", the thunder-bolt, love at first sight, that pitches us head first into passion when we least expect it. The Fool - some see him as light-hearted, and he can be, but he is also the one who risks all, who follows his heart and his instinct and throws himself into adventure, an act which only passion will sustain. He embodies freedom, and anyone who has known that freedom, if only for a short while, will know how passionately it inhabits us, and how we defend it with our lives. In the Mythic, the Fool is Dionysos, the young god of ecstasy and tragic theatre, twice born of love and hatred, whose followers, the Maenads, tore off their clothes and danced, filled with crazed passion. The Romans made him Bacchus, the wine god, and we all know where wine can lead us... The Empress, warm, sexy, the lover and mother all in one, holds secrets in her womb and her breasts. She is Venus and Hera, maybe, or Eve, although the Mythic portrays her as Demeter the fertile, one of the original goddesses, who emptied the world and made it cry out in hunger when her beloved daughter was taken from her. I love the Mythic drawing of the Empress, young, vital, incredibly attractive, she walks through a field of wheat, dressed in a gown of wild flowers. The Devil - someone said he was Pan? the Mythic also portrays him as the goat god. Pan, the animal in us, who hacked and tore at the riverside, tore at reeds, "'This is the way, laughed the great god Pan (Laughed while he sate by the river) The only way, since gods began to make sweet music, they could succeed.' Then, dropping his mouth to a hole in the reed, He blew in power by the river." But even in his more usual form, the Devil twists itself into our hearts and loins - our dark passion, our shadow, our hidden lust for our friend's wife, our secret desire to kill our neighbour, our overwhelming anger at our child. He is seductive, too, Milton's Lucifer sitting on his sulfurous stone, full of pride and beauty. He is the one who makes us give in when desire pulls at us, regardless of principle, or duty, or fear. The Lovers share some of the lust of the Devil, some of the "coup de foudre" of the Tower, some of the risk-taking of the Fool, much of the earthy warm sexiness of the Empress, but somehow - through transmutation, maybe (Temperance?) - they have added to the vocabulary of passion love, openness, tenderness, gift of self. Some say the Lovers are Choice - but who has any choice when Love offers itself, but to drink from its cup to the lees...? And of course, the World, which gathers all these together, and fills us with such an ecstasy of happiness and sadness that we can't always bear it.

Ace	28 Nov 2004
Helvetica wrote: The Tower is the card closest to the Franz Ferdinand song that started this thread - "I'm going to burn that city, burn that city..." The Tower burns, the city burns, it is Troy up in flames, Carthage razed to the ground, the Temple in Jerusalem, and Jeremiah passionately lamenting its loss, Rome destroyed, that we still mourn. In the Mythic deck it is Poseidon crashing his storm against a lighthouse, Poseidon who pursued Odysseus with his vengeance for years for the killing of his Cyclop man-eating son. It is also the "coup de foudre", the thunder-bolt, love at first sight, that pitches us head first into passion when we least expect it. I agree with you about the Tower. the Cannon Reed Witches Tarot has a great Tower: a plain donjon (Is that the right spelling) a simple tower with light streaming out of the windows. I always see it as so filled with energy that it is about to explode from it. That is "like water for chocolate" passion so great, you want to burst.

noby	29 Nov 2004
Wow, I really am enjoying reading all the different ideas and responses here. Helvetica and Ace, I love your thoughts on the Tower. I agree that one striking way ( pardon the pun :joke: ) to look at it is passion so powerful it just explodes from inside of you...

amyel	29 Nov 2004
Helvetica wrote: The Lovers share some of the lust of the Devil, some of the "coup de foudre" of the Tower, some of the risk-taking of the Fool, much of the earthy warm sexiness of the Empress, but somehow - through transmutation, maybe (Temperance?) - they have added to the vocabulary of passion love, openness, tenderness, gift of self. Some say the Lovers are Choice - but who has any choice when Love offers itself, but to drink from its cup to the lees...? Well, although I haven't quoted your entire post, I find it interesting that you discuss both the Lovers and the Devil. These are the shadow cards of one another, according to Mary Greer. Sort of "External" (Lovers) and 'Internal" (Devil) passions if you will....

Ace	29 Nov 2004
amyel wrote: I find it interesting that you discuss both the Lovers and the Devil. These are the shadow cards of one another, according to Mary Greer. Sort of "External" (Lovers) and 'Internal" (Devil) passions if you will.... I agree: look at the WorldTree Tarot: she does the Lovers and the devil as almost identical, but in the Lovers they face each other building energy between them, and in the Devil they stand back to back with energy buildt up between them!

jumptothemoonyea	29 Nov 2004
could be The Fool - this is the one who has no limits , purest form from the original source

Ace	29 Nov 2004
That is a good point, JTTMY! (if you don't mind my abbreviation) I started thinking of HOT cards (like the Tower, the lovers, the devil, Knight of Swords and cups, etc) and Cool cards like the High Priestess, 2 of Swords, the 4 of pentacles, and others. The 8 of cups? is sometimes hot and often cold, I think....

AriesK	29 Nov 2004
I definately have to agree with Helvetica and her posit on the Fool. To me it has always been a card of great adventure, great heart, truth and trust. Perhaps is it my Aries sun sign that attracts me to this card... I find myself often jumping off of cliffs without thinking... The fool has an emotional resonation with me that I would indeed describe as passionate. I know whenever it turns up in a reading I can't help but grinning at what I might find when, and where I land! K

Chubby Mummy	02 Dec 2004
In my thoth deck the strength card is described as "lust" which to me is one of the most passionate cards!

Fudugazi	04 Dec 2004
AriesK wrote: I definately have to agree with Helvetica and her posit on the Fool. To me it has always been a card of great adventure, great heart, truth and trust. Perhaps is it my Aries sun sign that attracts me to this card... I find myself often jumping off of cliffs without thinking... The fool has an emotional resonation with me that I would indeed describe as passionate. I know whenever it turns up in a reading I can't help but grinning at what I might find when, and where I land! K Oh, I love the Fool, though I am not an Aries (I think my Venus is in Aries, which might explain why I jump foolishly into love the way I do...). I love where the Fool takes me. But he scares me too - I know I would rather follow him, leaving other stuff undone, than let myself slow down and allow myself, and what I do, to grow - say with the Empress. I'm not sure what the answer for that is - I have recently taken a Fool-ish step into the unknown...into a much more settled life than I have known until now. Sounds contradictory? It is (well you know, us Pisces), but strangely, it feels like an adventure so far (ok, so it's not war, the Congo river or swimming naked under the moon, not in Geneva at any rate) - a step off a cliff into - what? And yes, like you I am smiling. But fluttering too. Will I stick it, without trying to scramble up that cliff again, back to the safety of my wars?

AriesK	04 Dec 2004
Helvetica wrote: a step off a cliff into - what? And yes, like you I am smiling. But fluttering too. Will I stick it, without trying to scramble up that cliff again, back to the safety of my wars? ...you think too much... adventures are like luck, they are not good or bad, it is what you do with them that count. Sometimes the jump IS the adventure, and I have found that trying to scramble back up to the top is like trying to step in the same river twice... every moment, every adventure, every decision taken or not changes us in some way. I sometimes wonder if the Fool is not the wisest card in the deck, or if not, perhaps the wisest-making. I wish you well, Helvetica, on your journey and hope the judges grade you with wisdom on the style, grace, and strength of your landing. K

Fudugazi	05 Dec 2004
AriesK wrote: ...Sometimes the jump IS the adventure, and I have found that trying to scramble back up to the top is like trying to step in the same river twice... Which Heraclitus told us, long ago, was quite impossible. So yes, we don't retrace our steps (good thing too, how boring!). But we can learn from past mistakes - including the mistake of not flying with the Fool when he bides us. AriesK wrote: I wish you well, Helvetica, on your journey and hope the judges grade you with wisdom on the style, grace, and strength of your landing. K Thank you! I hope they also have a large mattress ;-)

The Cards which communicate passion? thread was originally posted on 23 Nov 2004 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.