The Tarot conceals a mysterious and wonderful world, which has its roots in the collective unconscious. Even if many see in them the survival of foolish, useless, and dangerous superstitions. Tarot cards are much more than a deck of cards for improvised wizards or charlatans ready to steal money from the unfortunate. They are icons, archetypes that speak the language of symbols, recognized by most of us.
We have become accustomed to the language of words to the point of forgetting that there are other forms of communication, just think of art, which uses images to convey messages. Only through study and considerable effort can we regain possession and learn the secrets, just like a newborn baby takes its first steps into the world of words.
What is the Tarot
Tarots are icons, symbols, archetypes that share the nature of sacred images, and various idols. Images that are defined – Arcana – distinguished in Major and Minor. The term – Arcane – in turn, conceals the hidden meaning of – Ark – (custody in Greek). So these are images that must be kept so that they can be transmitted to posterity.
On the other hand, Tarot cards are also playing cards and as such, they reconcile two different universes, that of magic and the world of play. In fact, the 22 Major Arcana are more mystical, characterized by particular names such as – Death -, – Judgment -, The Moon, etc., the 56 Minor Arcana refer instead to traditional playing cards.
Why the Tarot is so popular
Interpreting them would favor the knowledge of oneself, acting on the awakening of ancestral memories and hidden aspects of our personality. Their symbolic language would speak directly to our unconscious, without needing to be filtered by the word. Reading the Tarot and meditating on them would therefore allow us to dialogue with the soul, with our deep self through the language of symbols.
Those who know how to interpret them correctly know the secrets of non-verbal language, acting as an intermediary between it and the consultant. Ultimately, the Tarot acts on a subliminal level, without our being aware of it, through the images, colors, and emotions they transmit.
Symbolic meaning
The psychoanalyst Carl Gustav Jung, who has always been interested in their symbolism, gave them an illuminating interpretation, to say the least, dissecting the deep symbolic meaning, defining them – psychological images, symbols with which one plays, how the unconscious seems to play with its contents. . They combine in certain ways, and the different combinations correspond to the joyful development of events in the history of humanity.
For Jung, interpreting the Tarot helps us to become familiar with the unconscious, to open a path towards it in order to rise to a new level of awareness. The figure of the Tarot that appears to us, therefore, speaks to our soul and certain reactions and thoughts follow. In this sense, the Tarot creates a bridge between reason and intuition.
In other words, if I think about a certain sector of my life and a certain card appears to me, it does not come out by chance but it is my unconscious that influences its exit. Because my unconscious already has the answer to that question and sends me the message through the extracted card.
Which will then be interpreted in solitude or with the help of a mediator or fortune teller. So it is not, as is often thought, the fortune-teller who brings out a Tarot rather than another, but the consultant himself. The Tarot, from this point of view, are real divine messengers. Obviously, the sequence of the cards is also important because it expresses a temporal or logical sequence, for example in some interpretations the first card represents the past, the second the present, the third the future.