Reading an Oracle

I've seen it said that Waking the Wild Spirit should be used more as an oracle than a tarot deck. What is the difference between the use of an oracle and tarot? I've never used an oracle. I have this deck, so that's why I was wondering.

Same here, i want an oracle but im not sure how to use it exactly...

I use my Oracles the same way I use my Tarot decks, the only difference that I can see is that Oracle decks have different meanings assigned to there particular cards such as Titanias Fortune Cards or The Druid Animal Oracle, the latter one in particular, you just have to work harder at trying to find out what there telling you. At least with Tarot there are millions of books with there interpretation of a particular card, not so with Oracles you usually just have the authors version and that can be a challenge if you think the card means some thing other than what the author of the deck says. But I always go with what I feel in the end, because I belive that the querents that come to you do so because you are the type of reader that they need at that particular time in thier life, thats why no reader is completley ever wrong, well except for the charletans we have all run into from time to time!

Well, I'll take a stab at this, and then you'll get a bunch of responses from folks who will tell you all the ways I'm wrong! It is my special talent.

As you know Tarot cards follow a very specific format and historic set of "rules". We modern people have started to play around more with Tarot and are changing things a bit, hence the endless discussions about what makes a Tarot deck a Tarot deck. Basically, 78 cards, four suits of cups, wands, pentacles and swords, four courts for each suit and then of course the remaining cards are the majors.

Oracles historically have been places, shrines or temples, where a wise woman or man gave out cryptic statements...example the Oracle at Delphi. Nowadays, many people are creating oracle decks, all kinds of them, and the decks cover all kinds of topics and styles. They have fewer rules than Tarot decks, and they are used by people for different things.

I use some oracle decks quite often and love them. My favorite is the Froud Faeries Deck. It is beautiful and I just layout cards like I do Tarot and read them intuitively.

Now with Tarot, many people give the cards meanings. So there is a common ground and language spoken around it. RWCS readers will all agree, more or less, that the Six of Cups talks about some kind of nostalgia, remembrance, youth, even birth of a baby. And so on.

With Oracles, there may be less consensus. There is room built into the Oracle for independent thinking or intuition. A little less rigidity, but I'm already thinking of a few Oracle decks that bust that statement!!!

Anyway, just get your Oracle and read it intuitively. Go with what comes to mind. Explore your symbol set, what you believe things mean.

Because whether it be Tarot or an Oracle, if you see a white dove, and the books says, "Peace, brotherhood, purity, innocence", but all you see is "chaos, disruption, turmoil" well then, why trick your mind into believing the first set of defintions? you gotta go with what is in your gutt.

Good luck!

I use Froud's oracle also. I think the difference that I have personally seen in using oracles is they seem to be more tuned to inner workings...personal issues...attitudes, I guess I will say. Almost an I Ching feeling. I know that I can ask the same question of an oracle deck and then a tarot deck and the way they answer me seems to be very different. But that is my own personal experience with them and slant on them.

beithe

Hi beithe,
welcome to the forum.
We have a Froud study group, and we are doing reading practice over there, come see us sometime!

I agree with you about inner work and oracles.
But, if we broaden the question isn't the Tarot an oracle?
(This ought to get things going....)

Hmmmmm...yes it is. I think that one of the differences with me is this. My connection to the actual cards is very different. In the Froud oracle the Green Woman and Himself are somehow soul mates. I feel an afinity to them and with them. Whereas in the original Tarot decks I don't feel the kinship with the Empress or the Tower. I feel that this is because the Major Arcana in a Tarot deck is so much deeper, archetypes, layers that I don't have a full understanding of. They are more apt to be structures that tantalize or even give me shivers than the oracles which seem to connect on a more conscious level. Maybe I see oracles as the Demiurge and Tarot decks as the God.

beithe (who has waaaay too many books to read up on)

Hi Lyric,

I'm wondering if you would get a different response to this question if you posted it in the Oracle, rather than Tarot, category. People that use Oracle decks seem to have a strong passion for them (yes, I am one of them). I use Tarot too, but I seem to be able to intuit more easily with the Oracle decks. Osho Zen Tarot is another Tarot deck that is sometimes discussed as being more like an Oracle deck.

For me, personally (and no-one can dispute a personal feeling - right???) I like the freedom of the Oracle decks because I don't feel they are steeped in rituals, and historical meanings.

You may wish to know in what situations would I use an Oracle deck, over a Tarot deck??? It's kind of hard to say......depends on the querent and the type of reading they're after. (Well, that's been a fat lot of help to you, hasn't it??? LOL)

purple_scorp

purple_scorp said:

Hi Lyric,

For me, personally (and no-one can dispute a personal feeling - right???) I like the freedom of the Oracle decks because I don't feel they are steeped in rituals, and historical meanings.

Click to expand...

There is more freedom for intuiting when using an oracle deck I think and for the reasons you give. I spend soooo much time and look at soooo many books when I use a regular deck. Symbolism, history, different meanings sometimes depending on whose LWB you have. Oracles are definitely more footloose and fancy free. I love both of them but for very different reasons.

beithe

You know this may be sacreligious but try using a Tarot like an oracle.
I do this with the Dance of Life. The book confuses me, so it sits unused on a shelf.
I now have a wonderful relationship with this deck, and my own meanings for the cards! And the beauty is that not all the cards come up. Interestingly there is a core set of cards that seem to come up over and over and it is a surprise to see one that doesn't usually come up.

For me, as an intuitive reader, I'm pulling in from so many sources no matter what deck I use. I have said elsewhere that all of my experiences to date, all the learning, seem to have prepared me for being a reader. But I'm not a Tarot symbolist officianado. There are those who say that what I've just said means that my readings aren't really Tarot readings. That just because I'm using a Tarot deck doesn't mean it is a Tarot reading.

Here's what is important to me: the sitter.
The we that is the deck, the sitter and myself. (And whatever it is that chooses to be revealed of course.)
We are diving into the murky waters of the Universe and the psyche, the soul and the unknown. It is so wonderful. Does it matter the deck? Not to me. All that is important is that it WORKS!