Court astrological associations in books, not lining up.

Disclaimer: Im about 50/50 on choosing the right place for these things, I promise Im trying! lol. Hopefully I got it right this time.

Im working with 2 books right now, Mary K. Greer's Tarot for yourself, and Marcus Katz Around the tarot in 78 days.

Ive noticed that their court cards don't match astrologically. For instance, In Mary's book when creating your tarot profile, the king of swords represents Aquarius, and in Marcus's book the king of swords represents gemini. Just one example, but it seems they are all off.

Which is right? Which is traditional? Is there a reason they don't agree? I know both authors are highly respected so I am a little confused at their lack of cohesion.

This has to do with the system each is using. The Rider-Waite-Smith deck puts the Kings at the top of the hierarchy (wrongly in my opinion, but the explanation is quite long and dull) while the Golden Dawn/Thoth puts the Knights at the top, correctly. But, Katz seems to make things topsy-turvy, since he uses the Knights' attributions for the Kings, which are traditionally called Princes or Emperors.

This is all very confusing, but Greer is correct, in my opinion. However, the Courts don't really belong to any one sign, they merely have a dominant influence of one sign and a recessive influence of another. The King of Swords sits on one decan of Capricorn and two of Aquarius.

I explain the whole thing better here:

http://tarotforum.net/showthread.php?t=257054

There's also a very helpful diagram made by someone who knows his stuff better than me.

For me, I find it better to look at the court cards in reference to their elemental correspondences rather than the astrological. It seems to make more sense to me that way.

Achlys said:

For me, I find it better to look at the court cards in reference to their elemental correspondences rather than the astrological. It seems to make more sense to me that way.

Click to expand...

Good point. I look at the elemental correspondences as the primary influence and the decan associations as a secondary input. The chart I put together of the Thoth courts and their astrological attributions (posted in the Thoth forum a while back) helped me quite a bit with the latter.

I'm glad this thread reminded my of Richard's "wheel" charts. I have them printed out and annotated but couldn't find them on my old hard drive, so I downloaded them again.

I'd go with Mary Greer rather than Marcus Katz.

Also, you might want to get Tarot Wisdom by Rachel Pollack. It's an excellent book for reference whether one is a beginner or an experienced Tarot reader. It's a great book.

Barleywine said:

Good point. I look at the elemental correspondences as the primary influence and the decan associations as a secondary input. The chart I put together of the Thoth courts and their astrological attributions (posted in the Thoth forum a while back) helped me quite a bit with the latter.

I'm glad this thread reminded my of Richard's "wheel" charts. I have them printed out and annotated but couldn't find them on my old hard drive, so I downloaded them again.

Click to expand...

I don't see either as primary or secondary. Rather, the elemental (Kabbalistic) attribution relates to the way in which the personality is conveyed, how their "powers" are used. The astrological attribution is the actual personality.

Thank you to all who replied!
Seems like I have quite a bit to research now.

Zephyros said:

This has to do with the system each is using. The Rider-Waite-Smith deck puts the Kings at the top of the hierarchy (wrongly in my opinion, but the explanation is quite long and dull) while the Golden Dawn/Thoth puts the Knights at the top, correctly. But, Katz seems to make things topsy-turvy, since he uses the Knights' attributions for the Kings, which are traditionally called Princes or Emperors.

This is all very confusing, but Greer is correct, in my opinion. However, the Courts don't really belong to any one sign, they merely have a dominant influence of one sign and a recessive influence of another. The King of Swords sits on one decan of Capricorn and two of Aquarius.

I explain the whole thing better here:

http://tarotforum.net/showthread.php?t=257054

There's also a very helpful diagram made by someone who knows his stuff better than me.

Click to expand...

I found your response extremely helpful! Thank you.
I will probably have to read through that essay a few times to get the most out of it. (As well as expand my astrology knowledge quite a bit! I find numerology so much easier to grasp.)

I will have to research the different systems a bit and see where that information leads.

JustJazzie said:

Thank you to all who replied!
Seems like I have quite a bit to research now.



I found your response extremely helpful! Thank you.
I will probably have to read through that essay a few times to get the most out of it. (As well as expand my astrology knowledge quite a bit! I find numerology so much easier to grasp.)

I will have to research the different systems a bit and see where that information leads.

Click to expand...

That's alright, it's astrology for people who don't know astrology. I certainly don't.

Zephyros said:

I don't see either as primary or secondary. Rather, the elemental (Kabbalistic) attribution relates to the way in which the personality is conveyed, how their "powers" are used. The astrological attribution is the actual personality.

Click to expand...

Perhaps "fundamental" would be a better term. It's the underlying elements (and particularly the "elemental humours") that give the signs and the planets much of their "coloration." In the present example, the Prince/King of Swords is two-thirds "airy" (sanguine Aquarius, with a touch of the melancholic due to its traditional Saturn rulership) but the last decan of Capricorn holds the mainly choleric, fiery Sun in the melancholic sign ruled by pragmatic Saturn, lending the Prince/King an authoritative gravity and industriousness he might otherwise lack. The astrological associations for Sun in Capricorn include "resolutely ambitious, steady, sure-footed, dogmatic, prudent, utilitarian, security-obsessed, worldly, careful, a hard bargainer, melancholic, lonely" - in short, many things we wouldn't normally associate with this rather adaptable, idealistic, marginally shallow, light-footed card.

You're, right. Tomato, tomatto.

Another way of looking at the Courts is as shorthand for three Minors, in this case the Four of Disks, Five of Swords and Six of Swords.

Truly, even if you know the system and know it by heart easily enough to deconstruct a Court on the fly, they're still maddeningly complex. But then, since they are meant to represent people, people are extremely complex. In the other classes of cards the attributions generally lead to one main idea but the Courts have different, sometimes contradictory sides to them that make them entire case studies.