Hierophant in love readings

MariaPeea said:

Be careful, it completely depends on the context of the situation. I had the Hierophant come out as the outcome of a relationship between me and this guy, and it turned out it just meant things would stay the way they were which was in his "comfort zone". He was the hierophant and he liked things just as they were, and so that's how they stayed. And that was not together, LOL.

On a more positive note, it could also mean things between them/you will be much more stable and maybe more committed. So, the relationship will move into a more "traditional" stage, but doesn't necessarily mean they/you will end up married. Though it doesn't mean no, either!

Click to expand...

I agree. I have seen Hierophant in relationships that were horrible and abusive. I knew of a married couple where the woman cheated on the wife all the time and the wife was very unhappy. I asked the cards why they remained married to each other when they obviously no longer loved each other and the Hierophant card showed up. The card was telling them that they were remaining married for the sake of being married instead of using good common sense of getting a divorce.

Hierophant means in this case being content and lazy by doing something out of culture, tradition and habit instead of using a rational mind of trying to do something else, to do something different and new.

When I had a relationship with a man that I wanted him to commit to me in marriage, I once asked why he wouldn't marry me and I got the Hierophant card. He was content to conforming to the way things were and not change to do anything new like GET MARRIED.

Hierophant doesn't always mean marriage. Don't assign it to marriage. It's over all meaning is just "conforminty, peer pressure, tradition, of culture". Yes, marriage can be a tradition within certain cultures, but it is not the only tradition in regards to relationships. The other tradition in many patriarchal relationship is that men rule over women, or men controlling women, or dominating the relationship, like I mentioned above the issue of only men being able to bring up the topic of marriage and be the only gender with the priviledge of proposing to a woman. While society looks down on a woman proposing to a man, if she doesn't want to wait for years trying to figure out if a man wants to marry her or not, which in essence waiting for a man to bring up the topic is a total waste of her time, when she could be forming relationships with other men who are desiring to be married, if her current significant other has no interest in legally or religiously solidifying a relationship with her through marriage.

Hierophant could also stand for racism, institutional racism. I have witness Hierophant show up in relationships of interracial couples where one partner doesn't mind dating and having sex with a person of another race, but they wouldn't marry them, even if they loved that person, because society has said that that particular ethnic group is "below" or "socially inferior" to your own ethnic group. So why wouldn't you marry the person you love? Because of The Hierophant saying that it is inappropiate to have interracial or interreligious or even homosexual marriages.

These are interesting takes...This is kind of why, however, Im falling out of love with tarot. In the end, none of it is every right... or more precisely, the take you had on it wasnt right yet the cards can be brought to mean something different than originally thought so that you can say"Oh, this is what they were saying". It frustrates me. Sorry, Im venting. Im just kind of getting frustrated with it.

SunriseDesire said:

These are interesting takes...This is kind of why, however, Im falling out of love with tarot. In the end, none of it is every right... or more precisely, the take you had on it wasnt right yet the cards can be brought to mean something different than originally thought so that you can say"Oh, this is what they were saying". It frustrates me. Sorry, Im venting. Im just kind of getting frustrated with it.

Click to expand...

No tarot meaning is there and does not change. The meaning is the meaning. What your issue is isn't the meaning, but your ability to be perceptive what the meaning is telling you.

For instance, Hierophant means nothing in general but "tradition, conforming to society norms, peer pressure to do whatever mainstream culture tells you to do. Everything that makes up culture and society such as education, law, sociology, ethics, morality, art, the humanities, ettiqutte, etc"

Now these things don't explain if they are good or bad. So you may see in a relationship reading the Hierophant, the card can be good or bad based on the situation of the reader.

Everyone gets all excited when they see Hierophant in a relationship reading, mostly women, because we treat marriage as the end all to our existence, just like a person wins the Mega Million Dollar lottery ticket. So everyone gets freaking excited to see that card and assumes it means a marriage or wedding is going to be happening to them, which could be the very WRONG IDEA.

If you see Hierophant in a relationship reading just give it its generic meaning, please. "What is going on in my relationship? Hierophant card? Mmm, that means my relationship will be traditional, conform to society, has something to do with enculturation of society." And just keep your answer just as that. Because Hierophant in relationship could mean a variety of things in regards to romantic relationships, for example:

1. If you live in a male dominated society where men are raised with the idea to dominate the relationship, because it is CULTURAL for women to be passive to men then Hierophant means "to follow the tradition of society of men being the dominate partner in the relationship and the female be subservient one."

2. If you live in a society where little girls get married off at age 12 to 40 year old men, then Hierophant is saying that your marriage will be TRADITIONAL of you as a female marrying a man about 30 years older than you.

3. If you live in a society where only men work and women stay home and raise the children then Hierophant states that your man wants you to be a Stay At Home Wife/Mother and would be highly upset if you decided to work outside the home.

Or...it can be the absolutely reverse depending on whatever society you live in...

4. It may be TRADITIONAL for a woman to go to college and be highly educated in your society, so by TRADITION a man expects his wife to be highly educated, perhaps work outside the house and he would be upset if his wife decided to be a Stay-At-Home Wife/mother because doing so would give him the burden of being absolutely 100% responsible for the financial outcome of his family, a burden he may not ever want in life. It maybe be TRADITIONAL for him that both couples have their own income.

5. It maybe TRADITIONAL in your culture to marry someone you never met in your whole life until the day of the wedding. The Hierophant could mean in your culture that you will have an arrange marriage with some complete stranger.

So in essence, Hierophant does not mean "marriage" by itself. Nor does it mean, even if it did indicate marriage, that the marriage will be happy and rewarding. Your marriage could be the biggest hell and mistake of your life. I am sure lots of women getting married due to certain circumstances in their life, or due to cultural traditions that they don't like are quite sad, angry, or scared about being married. Especially if you come from a culture where you are a young girl married to some old man with tons of age liver warts all over his face that you have to have sex with. Or you got married to a guy, because you are pregnant and financially broke plus can't have an abortion because it is illegal where you live. So you get married by TRADITION that is is not Godly to have a child out of wedlock and create a "bastard" child. But deep down inside, you know that you don't love the man you are marrying and the man doesn't even love you. You just had sex out of lust, or like many teenagers, had sex as a sexual experimentation. But besides that one act of having sex, you know deep down in your heart that you wouldn't have anything to do with that person that you are marrying (Hierophant). You just got married due to peer pressure of your religious community (Hierophant).

I hope that helps.

SunriseDesire said:

As the final outcome card, when asking how a romantic relationship will turn out...if you recieve the hierophant, what would you take that to mean? Ive heard marriage

Click to expand...

In order to get a decent relationship happening, you have to treat your partner with total integrity according to the mores of the society you live in.

I have been getting that card a lot too in relationship readings about my future with someine I truly care about but it is way too early to be sure of things. I love everyone here who said marriage. LOL I see that sometimes then stop myself and think it might be just wishful thinking. I love that others see that card that way too.



Babs

SunriseDesire said:

These are interesting takes...This is kind of why, however, Im falling out of love with tarot. In the end, none of it is every right... or more precisely, the take you had on it wasnt right yet the cards can be brought to mean something different than originally thought so that you can say"Oh, this is what they were saying". It frustrates me. Sorry, Im venting. Im just kind of getting frustrated with it.

Click to expand...

Tarot gives very clear messages most times (and on those rare cases where it doesn;t there are always clarifiers).

They talk very clearly but to each of us in different ways. Almost like they speak a different language to each of us. You may get your answers in English. someone else here in Chinese, someone else in Russian...metaphorically not literally of course. They don't translate well from one language to the other, as the grammar and syntax are not the same, But the answers each of us gets are clear to each of us.

The thing is that Tarot talks to us mainly through the languge of intuition. That is not transferable. What someone else's intuition tells them is the answer, what their intuiition tells them is the best reading method for them, will not likely be the same answer that you would get and not the best reading method for you.

No one can teach you how to connect to your intuition. You have to do it from inside you. What your intuition will tell you will not usually be what is right for others and vice versa. Tarot is about listening inwardly and trusting what comes. Even if no one else in the entire world see it that way, if that is what came up from inside you that it YOUR answer.

There is no such thing, imo, as the take you had on something wasn't right. If you felt that inside that WAS the answer. If someone else sees someting differently THEY were not accurate. The answer is sent to each of us in code, in a language ONLY we can decipher properly, because the powers that be KNOW exactly who we aer inside, exactly how we think, exactly what our past has been, exactly what our emotional makeup is . etc and the answer is sent to each of us in the format that we will best understand given all that we are inside. No one else can be you, the message will be sent in ways that are meant for only you to understand clearly.

Sure you can ask as an intellectual question what the cards mean to others. But once a reading has been done, you can't ask after the fact, as only the original reader has the key within them to unlock the code.

The real trick to Tarot is just to learn to connect to your intuition and trust it whereever it takes you, not to get lost in thoughts of what things COULD mean. It's about FEELING what they mean in each reading and trusting your feelings.

Those are my beliefs on that.

Babs

The Hierophant...I shudder everytime it pops up in a relationship reading. It has never been about getting married for anyone I've done readings for. Mostly I read for women (it just happens to be that woman ask me for readings more often than men do), often this card meant the man was running the show, making all the rules, etc. Things stayed the way HE wanted them to stay, as long as it made him happy.

For example, I read for someone who had a guy she was friends with but also was intimate with (the friends with benefits kinda thing). She wanted more, she wanted a committed relationship with the guy...But it never moved beyond the friends and sex phase, and the Hierophant was in the outcome position there also. In the end they stopped seeing each other completely. But this went on for several years!!

I usually see the Hierophant being a good life lesson in the end though. Like the girl I mentioned above, she later told me she would never settle for that sort of relationship ever again.

Another example, is finding out the other person IS already married. Atleast that's been my experience.

These are just 2 examples... there's many more but these are the ones off the top of my head.

SunriseDesire said:

These are interesting takes...This is kind of why, however, Im falling out of love with tarot. In the end, none of it is every right... or more precisely, the take you had on it wasnt right yet the cards can be brought to mean something different than originally thought so that you can say"Oh, this is what they were saying". It frustrates me. Sorry, Im venting. Im just kind of getting frustrated with it.

Click to expand...

I hear you, sometimes getting too much information from so many different people and sources can be frustrating. I have read cards for decades, I was so confident in my skills until I found the internet and all the information found here. It blew my mind how others looked at and read the cards. I was always taught that you listen to your own intuition, do a reading once, and move on. Here a card and all of it's meanings are hashed out over and over, which is a good thing but it can be overwhelming. All of the meanings above are right and wrong depending on your view point. Take what you feel is right and throw the rest away.

Hierophant in western society today can be very confusing. Where I am from anything goes, "if it feels good, do it". There are just no morals, or no rules. Where does the Hierophant fit in when there seems to be no rules of society? 40 or 50 years ago, it would have meant marriage, but now in todays climate what would it mean? Moving in together, perhaps monogamy? This is where I would have to rely on intuition.

You care not alone, tarot is free flowing, different to every person, and can be confusing and frustrating.

It's fascinating to see all the different spins on this card. I usually "get" the Hierophant as the "mainstream" or the "status quo" card, which is another way of tying in ideas of conformity, culture and society, norms, group think, tradition, doing things "the same way everybody else seems to do," not rocking the boat, etc. Marriage is only one tradition among many, and what is mainstream in one society is not necessarily mainstream in another. I certainly do not automatically read "marriage" when the Hierophant pops up in a reading; in fact, it's usually the last interpretation my brain comes up with

Canadian Girl said:

It's fascinating to see all the different spins on this card. I usually "get" the Hierophant as the "mainstream" or the "status quo" card, which is another way of tying in ideas of conformity, culture and society, norms, group think, tradition, doing things "the same way everybody else seems to do," not rocking the boat, etc. Marriage is only one tradition among many, and what is mainstream in one society is not necessarily mainstream in another. I certainly do not automatically read "marriage" when the Hierophant pops up in a reading; in fact, it's usually the last interpretation my brain comes up with

Click to expand...

Actually this is very much in line with me usual meanings for the card too. But marriage is another interpretaton of it that can fit. While I usually tend to see it as you described above, sometimes your intuition kicks in and is screaming marriage.

Babs