Today’s Tarot Card for July 25 is The Lovers

The Lovers

This Tarot Deck: Etteilla

 

General Meaning:  Although it has taken on a strictly romantic revision of meaning in some modern decks, traditionally the Lovers card of Tarot reflected the challenges of choosing a partner. At a crossroads, one cannot take both paths. The images on this card in different decks have varied more than most, because we have had so many ways of looking at sex and relationships across cultures and centuries.

Classically, the energy of this card reminded us of the real challenges posed by romantic relationships, with the protagonist often shown in the act of making an either-or choice. To partake of a higher ideal often requires sacrificing the lesser option. The path of pleasure eventually leads to distraction from spiritual growth. The gratification of the personality eventually gives way to a call from spirit as the soul matures.

Modern decks tend to portray the feeling of romantic love with this card, showing Adam and Eve at the gates of Eden when everything was still perfect. This interpretation portrays humanity before the Fall, and can be thought to imply a different sort of choice — the choice of evolution over perfection, or the choice of personal growth through relationship — instead of a fantasy where everything falls into place perfectly and is taken care of without effort.

Today’s Tarot for July 24 is The Hierophant

The Hierophant

General Meaning:  Traditionally known as the Hierophant, this card refers to a Master and the learning of practical lessons from the study of Natural Law. This energy of this card points to some agent or resource that can reveal the secrets of life, the cycles of the moon and tides, the links between human beings and the heavens.

Because monasteries were the only places a person could learn to read and write in the middle ages, a Hierophant was one to whom a student would petition for entry. He was the one to set the curriculum for the neophyte’s course of study.

Often pictured with the right hand raised in blessing, the Hierophant is linked with the ancient lineage of Melchezidek, initiator of the Hebrew priestly tradition, the one who passes on the teachings. All shamans of any tradition draw upon this archetype.

Today’s Tarot Card for July 23 is The Emperor

The Emperor

This Tarot Deck: Dragon

 

General Meaning:  In the most practical terms, what has traditionally been called the Emperor card represents the highest leadership, a head of state or the most exemplary and powerful person in the realm. This archetypal ruler is responsible for the positive working out of affairs of a society or community, which are directly proportional to his well being and happiness.

The more enlightenment and cosmic perspective this energy brings, the better life is for all. The Emperor archetype masters the world of matter and physical manifestation. When you apply this card to your situation, acknowledge your potentials for mastery. Reinforce a sense of sovereignty within yourself, despite any self-limiting beliefs, habits or appearances to the contrary.

Today’s Tarot Card for July 20 is The Magician

The Magician

This Tarot Deck: Cat People

 

General Meaning: Traditionally, the Magus is one who can demonstrate hands-on magic — as in healing, transformative rituals, alchemical transmutations, charging of talismans and the like. A modern Magus is any person who completes the circuit between heaven and Earth, one who seeks to bring forth the divine ‘gold’ within her or himself.

At the birth of Tarot, even a gifted healer who was not an ordained clergyman was considered to be in league with the Devil! For obvious reasons, the line between fooling the eye with sleight of hand, and charging the world with magical will was not clearly differentiated in the early Tarot cards.

Waite’s image of the Magus as the solitary ritualist communing with the spirits of the elements — with its formal arrangement of symbols and postures — is a token of the freedom we have in modern times to declare our spiritual politics without fear of reprisal. The older cards were never so explicit about what the Magus was doing. It’s best to keep your imagination open with this card. Visualize yourself manifesting something unique, guided by evolutionary forces that emerge spontaneously from within your soul.

Taking Care Of Your Divinatory Tools

Taking Care Of Your Divinatory Tools

Because oracles are often handled by many people, you should be sure to cleanse and consecrate them when necessary. This means when you first get them, and when you have had a particularly negative client or one with a great deal of misfortune. You should also cleanse the tool after a day of heavy reading, or at least once a week, if you don’t do that many.

To cleanse a divinatory tool is simple. Let it sit for a few hours in sunlight or moonlight and finish off with a few drops of holy oil or water.

Keep your tools in some type of covering. Black keeps out the negativity. If you use stones, cards, or coins you may want a throwing or divining cloth to set on the surface of the table or floor. You can make your own out of beautiful material, add fringes, embroider designs, etc.

The size of the reading cloth depends primarily on the scope of your readings. If you do large card spreads or use two divinatory vehicles, you may want a cloth that covers most of the table top

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To Ride A Silver Broomstick

New Generation Witchcraft

by Silver Ravenwolf

ISBN 0-87542-791-X

Transferred over from old WOTC group

Today’s Tarot Card for July 19th is The Fool

The Fool

This Tarot Deck: Aquarian

 

General Meaning:  Pamela Coleman-Smith’s artful rendition of an “innocent Fool” archetype (Rider-Waite deck) is often used to represent Tarot in general. Early classical versions of the Fool card, however, portray quite a different character — a person driven by base needs and urges, who has fallen into a state of poverty and deprivation.

In some instances, he is made out to be a carnival entertainer or a huckster. In others, he is portrayed as decrepit and vulnerable — as the cumulative result of his delusions and failures. Not until the 20th century do you see the popular Rider-Waite image of the Fool arise — that of an innocent Soul before its Fall into Matter, as yet untainted by contact with society and all its ills.

Modern decks usually borrow from the Rider-Waite imagery. Most Fool cards copy the bucolic mountainside scene, the butterfly, the potential misplaced step that will send the Fool tumbling into the unknown. Don’t forget, however, that the earlier versions of this card represented already-fallen humanity, over-identified with the material plane of existence, and beginning a pilgrimage towards self-knowledge, and eventually, wisdom. The Fool reminds us to recognize the path of personal development within ourselves — and the stage upon that path where we find ourselves — in order to energize our movement toward deeper self-realization.

Today’s Tarot Card for July 17 is Judgment

Judgment

 

This Tarot Deck: Medieval Cat

General Meaning: What has traditionally been known as the Judgment card, sometimes entitled Resurrection, represents the great reunion that the ancients believed would happen once in every age. This was the time when souls are harvested and taken Home to their place of origin, outside the solar system. Then the World is seeded with a batch of new souls and the process starts over.

From a modern point of view, this great reunion — which includes every personality that you have ever been and every soul that you have done deep work with — reunites to consciously complete the process. In a way, we symbolically celebrate this returning to center every year on our birthday.

In personal terms, the Judgment cards points to freedom from inner conflicts, and so clear a channel, that the buried talents and gifts of past incarnations can come through an individual in this lifetime. This card counsels you to trust the process of opening yourself, because what emerges is of consistently high quality. You can effortlessly manifest as a multi-dimensional being, and assist in evoking that response from others.

Your Daily Number for July 16: 6

Today is a lucky day for you, in which you’re likely to experience progress in your career and/or finances. You feel a sense of closeness with relatives and friends, and an overall healing of the heart. Few things could be better.

Fast Facts

About the Number 6

Theme: Family and Social Responsibility, Service, Healing
Astro Association: Gemini
Tarot Association: Lovers

Lighten Up – Top Ten Ways To Piss Off A Pagan

Top Ten Ways To Piss Off A Pagan

1. Ask them if they are Satan worshippers.

2. Be considerate, rearrange their altar so it will look neat.

3. Blow out their altar candle if it is still daylight. (No need to waste a good candle!)

4. Pick up their gems for a closer look.

5. Sharpen their dull, black-handled knife.

6. Witness to them about the ‘One True Religion’.

7. Untie the knots in their cord.

8. Take hold of their jewelry for a closer look.

9. Play card games with their Tarot deck.

10. Ask them if they are Satan worshippers.

Today’s Tarot Card for July 15th is The Sun

The Sun

This Tarot Deck: Gummy Bear Tarot

General Meaning:  What has traditionally been known as the Sun card is about the self — who you are and how you cultivate your personality and character. The earth revolves around the sun to make up one year of a person’s life, a fact we celebrate on our birthday.

The Sun card could also be titled “Back to Eden.” The Sun’s radiance is where one’s original nature or unconditioned Being can be encountered in health and safety. The limitations of time and space are stripped away; the soul is refreshed and temporarily protected from the chaos outside the garden walls.

Under the light of the Sun, Life reclaims its primordial goodness, truth and beauty. If one person is shown on this card, it is usually signifying a human incarnation of the Divine. When two humans are shown, the image is portraying a resolution of the tension between opposites at all levels. It’s as if this card is saying “You can do no wrong — it’s all to the good!”

Today’s Tarot Card for July 14 is The Star

The Star

This Tarot Deck: Celestial

General Meaning: What has traditionally been known as the Star card is about reconnecting one’s Soul with the Divine — the transcending of personality, family, community and reputation. It has to do ultimately with the freedom to be one’s Self. The Soul is responding to celestial influences — forces that can provide the personality with a stronger sense of purpose. The Star card helps us to remember our exalted origins and our attraction to a Higher Union.

This card could also be called the “Celestial Mandate” — that which refers us back to our reason for being, our mission in this lifetime. The Star reminds us that, in a sense, we are agents of Divine Will in our day-to-day lives. If we let go of the idea that we are supposed to be in control, we can more easily notice and appreciate the synchronicities that are nudging us along. In this way, we become more conscious of the invisible Helping Hand, and we better understand our place within — and value to — the larger Cosmos

Today’s Tarot Card for July 12 is Temperance

Temperance

This Tarot Deck: Golden Tarot

General Meaning:  What is traditionally known as the Temperance card is a reference to the Soul. Classically female, she is mixing up a blend of subtle energies for the evolution of the personality. One key to interpreting this card can be found in its title, a play on the process of tempering metals in a forge.

Metals must undergo extremes of temperature, folding and pounding, but the end product is infinitely superior to impure ore mined from the earth. In this image, the soul volunteers the ego for a cleansing and healing experience which may turn the personality inside-out, but which brings out the gold hidden within the heart. (This card is entitled “Art” in the Crowley deck.)

Today’s Tarot Card for July 11 is The Hanged Man

The Hanged Man

This Tarot Deck: Lord of the Rings

 

General Meaning: Traditionally, the card known as the Hanged Man usually indicates a lack of ability to help oneself through independent action. This energy is arrested and awaiting judgment. With this card, there is no avenue for the will to regain control until the situation has passed.

This represents a good time to be philosophical, to study and meditate upon the position you find yourself in, and form resolutions for the moment you become free again. Only those who possess wisdom, patience and optimism will be able to see through limitations, including possible humiliation, to grasp the inspiring lesson one can gain from such an experience.

Today’s Tarot Card for July 9 is Wheel of Fortune

Wheel of Fortune

This Tarot Deck: Connolly

General Meaning:    The central theme of what is traditionally called the Wheel of Fortune card is cyclical change. The Wheel keeps on rolling, churning events in a ceaseless progression of ups and downs, either way freeing us from the past. No one can escape its cyclical action, which can feel somewhat terrifying — no matter whether we are rising or falling. When one is balanced on top there is a moment of crystal clarity, but the only part of the Wheel not going up and down is the hub, which is your eternal Self, the Source of Freedom.
Every one of us will occupy all the points on the wheel at some time or another. The cycle of the wheel is its lesson — and we can learn to take comfort in it (as we do when we celebrate our birthday). If you don’t like the look of things right now, just wait — things will change. Of course, if you do like the look of things right now, enjoy it while it lasts, because that will change too!

Today’s Tarot Card for July 8 is The Anchoret

The Anchoret

This Tarot Deck: Cagliostro

General Meaning: The challenge of what has traditionally been known as the Hermit card is to be able to recognize a teacher in a humble disguise. This font of mysterious knowledge will not make it easy for the student to acquire his wisdom, as it takes time and long contemplation to fathom what he knows. He often speaks wordlessly, or in ancient and barbaric tongues, communicating with the elements, animals and Nature herself.

While the hourglass was an identifying feature on the earliest Hermit cards, more modern ones have shifted the metaphor, showing more or less light released from his lantern. In either case, the Hermit card reminds us of the value of time away from the hubbub of civic life, to relax the ego in communion with Nature.

Today’s Tarot Card for July 7th is Strength

Strength

This Tarot Deck: Angel Tarot

General Meaning: What has traditionally been known as the Strength card represents Nature which, however wild in its primal form, is tamed by our subtler, finer (feminine, interior) self. The will and passion of our instinctive nature does not need to be broken, but refined and brought to consciousness — so that all levels of Creation, inner and outer, may come into harmony.

The feminine soul-force contains a persuasive power that can nurture and induce cooperation from others, stilling disruptive energies by harmonizing differences in the spirit of collective good will.

Today’s Tarot Card for July 3rd is The Emperor

The Emperor

This Tarot Deck: Tarot of the Witches

General Meaning: In the most practical terms, what has traditionally been called the Emperor card represents the highest leadership, a head of state or the most exemplary and powerful person in the realm. This archetypal ruler is responsible for the positive working out of affairs of a society or community, which are directly proportional to his well being and happiness.

The more enlightenment and cosmic perspective this energy brings, the better life is for all. The Emperor archetype masters the world of matter and physical manifestation. When you apply this card to your situation, acknowledge your potentials for mastery. Reinforce a sense of sovereignty within yourself, despite any self-limiting beliefs, habits or appearances to the contrary.

New Moon Report for July 3rd – Mars In Libra

New Moon Report

By Jeff Jawer

 

Mars In Libra

Tuesday, July 3, 5:33 am PDT, 8:33 am EDT

Assertive Mars has been busy managing details since its entry into efficient Virgo last November. Its move into sociable Libra opens up new opportunities for personal and business alliances, making this a favorable time to launch a product or seek a job. Passive aggression is the shadow of this transit because anger can hidden behind insincere smiles. Mending fences and making compromises are fine as long as inner truth isn’t sacrificed to maintain appearances.

Today’s Tarot Card for June 19th is Wheel of Fortune

Wheel of Fortune

This Tarot Deck: Moon Garden

 

General Meaning: The central theme of what is traditionally called the Wheel of Fortune card is cyclical change. The Wheel keeps on rolling, churning events in a ceaseless progression of ups and downs, either way freeing us from the past. No one can escape its cyclical action, which can feel somewhat terrifying — no matter whether we are rising or falling. When one is balanced on top there is a moment of crystal clarity, but the only part of the Wheel not going up and down is the hub, which is your eternal Self, the Source of Freedom.

Every one of us will occupy all the points on the wheel at some time or another. The cycle of the wheel is its lesson — and we can learn to take comfort in it (as we do when we celebrate our birthday). If you don’t like the look of things right now, just wait — things will change. Of course, if you do like the look of things right now, enjoy it while it lasts, because that will change too!

Your Daily Number for June 15: 2

You’re fine tuned and sensitive today, reading other people easily and clearly. You may play the part of the peacemaker today, and others may perceive you as being a bit self-righteous. Try not to annoy others with the force of your convictions.

 

Fast Facts

About the Number 2

Theme: Adaptable, Tactful, Gentle, Cautious
Astro Association: Moon
Tarot Association: High Priestess