The Images of the Tarot Oracle in Psychic Readings

Death

The image of Death is only sometimes a portent of a physical death. The fear that it strikes in many people who are unfamiliar with the Tarot Oracle is mostly misplaced. In most cases, the image of Death pertains in a more generalized way to the idea of change and transformation. In the course of any human life, there are many little deaths and rebirths. The appearance of the image of Death may signal the end of one specific path of development, or the need for placing a boundary between past and present. It often describes a time of transition between one pattern of being and another. It may suggest that old and outworn modes of thought and feeling ought to be dispensed with, in the spirit of "out with the old, and in with the new." But even when a physical death is heralded by the appearance of this image, it is important to view its meaning in the proper perspective. We moderns have an excessively intolerant and distorted view of death. We take it to be the end not only of a physical body, which it is, but also of an ineffable essence, which it is not. We suppose erroneously that death is the opposite of life. But it is not. The opposite of death is birth. Life is eternal; hence the poet John Dunne's boldness of address, when he said, "Death be not proud, though some have called thee mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so, for those whom thou think'st thou dost overthrow, die not, poor death, nor yet canst thou kill me."

As an example of an instance in which the image of Death did not pertain to a physical death, consider the case of one of our clients who asked for our sense of the prospects in his relationship with his boyfriend. The reversal of the image of Death was not a promising forecast for the future of the relationship. But more than that, it suggested that something already dead was being allowed to go unburied; that a condition of stasis and stagnation had set in with respect to this relationship. We suggested to our client that it might be wise to consider the possibility that he was in denial with respect to the relationship. It would be necessary to examine the history of the relationship, and its present situation, with utmost objectivity, in order to come to a dispassionate judgment about its ultimate viability. It is hardly ever easy to accept a death, even of a specifically non-physical kind.