Hi Jen,
Thanks for this thread! I had been thinking for some time about starting a Tarot thread but I wasn't sure about it, so I'm glad to see it has arisen. You read my mind.
A reason that I hesitated to start a Tarot thread, is that I thought it would lead to the inevitable quagmire of confusion regarding astrological correspondances to the Tarot.
I have worked with Tarot for about a dozen years now, and believe me, I have tried every which way to correspond the 22 cards neatly with astrological symbolism - and found that nothing works, not if we are trying to succinctly to attribute one just one astrlogical symbol to one Major card.
The set of correspondences you provide above are Crowley's correspondances from The Book of Thoth. This is one of numerous methods of assigning astrology to the cards, and by far the most publicised and the system I worked with for years before I changed my mind.
I found the Crowley correspondences unworkable. Take the Moon for example, Crowley corresponds the Moon to the Priestess, which would seem very odd in that there is actually a card called 'The Moon' (hint, hint).
He attributes Virgo, the symbol of the undefiled young girl who is yet a virgin, to the Hermit, the symbol of the gnarled up, doddering old man, which would seem quite to the contrary. Virgo would seem more fitting to the Priestess, in this sense at least.
Crowleys attribution also spoils the symbolism of the sets of the complementary opposites in the cards. For example, the Sun and Moon are obviously a set of dynamic opposites in the Tarot, so why does Crowley upturn the applecart by corresponding them with the Sun and Pisces, which have little to do with each other. If he had attributed them to the Sun and Moon, or Pisces and Virgo, then this would make more sense as they are complementary opposite within astrology, as are the Sun and Moon cards in Tarot. Why is the Empress Venus, but Emperor Aries? If one was Venus one Mars, or one Aries and one Libra then fine.
Of course I understand that Crowley was also trying to correspond both the cards and astrology to the hebrew alphabet at the same time, but I don't speak, know, work or live with hebrew and even if I did, his attributions still feel erroneous.
I just don't like these attributions because some correspondences to some cards seem just plain inappropriate, and it disturbs the harmony of complementary pairs or groups of cards.
(I have Mercury in the middle of Libra, and the most dignified planet in my chart, Saturn, is conjunct this Mercury, and of course as a Virgo, you might see why the harmonic and evenly balanced ordering of things is pretty much essential to me :? ).
Given that we have 12 signs and 10 planets to work with in astrology, it is extremely tempting to try to neatly correspond these to the 22 glyphs of the Tarot. I have spent many a sleepless night in the past trying to achieve the perfect correspondance but any attempt always fails. There are cards, signs and planets that would fit into each other in too many myriad ways. There are always remainders to which one thing can't properly be corresponded to the other without upsetting everything else.
I came to the conclusion that if we try to neatly define a planet/sign correspondence to each individual card, then it stifles both our understanding of astrology and our understanding of the Tarot, the former in which I am a novice, the latter in which, I dare say, I am expert.
For example, in Crowleys associations, the Empress is Venus and Venus is the Empress, but in astrology, Venus is not always queenly or maternal, in Tarot the Empress is not always sweet, delicate or Venusian. This is because in astrology the nature and qualities of Venus depend so much on what all the other planets are doing and where all are arranged around the zodiac, and in Tarot the nature and quality of what the turning of the Empress means is coloured so strongly by the fall of the rest of the cards in the layout.
This is why I came to understand, uncomfortable as it may feel, that we cannot attribute astrological tones in the cards until they have been layed out and observed, and the astrological correspondences appropriate to each card will change, layout after layout.
To attribute single astrological symbols to single cards, works well if you are a beginner, and the cards are only read one by one by one, without comparing and contrasting them against one another, grouping them, reading
between the cards and exploring the relationship between all the cards in the spread as one single, coherent, unified entity.
Each card has each and every astrological symbol potentially within it's own symbolism, some of these astrological will usually be more prominent in some cards than in others, but it isn't until they are layed out that we can discern what these are.
To illustrate this example, lets take The Hermit. In a sense he is Lunar, for he is a wanderer, he is especially the waning Moon for he is old and haggered and retreats from the light of day. In another sense we might see him as Jupiterian for he is wise, sage-like, a venturer who expands beyond his bounds in search of something greater. In another sense he may be Saturn, old, mean and miserly, a loner who shuns the world to walk alone. These are but three examples, there is no reason why you can't go through all the signs and planets and think of the ways in which they can tie with every Major card. Having considered this, then suppose that The Hermit turns up in a layout right next to Death, or The Hanged Man, then these cards would reinforce each others Saturnian qualities. If the Hermit turns up next to The Wheel and The Hierophant, then perhaps these cards are reinforcing each other's Jupiterian natures, bringing out the more jovial and expansive nature of the now happy-go-lucky Hermit.
If the Chariot lay next to Emperor/Tower, then its Martian characteristics are reinforced, such as an army tank, a vehicle of war, but if it lands next to Hermit or Magician, then perhaps its more Mercurial characteristics are brought to the fore, as the means to get from A to B.
There are a million examples I could give, but the point I am making is that to try to correspond each single astrological key, tempting as it is, singly with each Major card, will ultimately come to restrict the imagination rather than enrich it.
The Sun and Moon, Star and Wheel are interesting cards astrologically. When the Sun appears with the Wheel, it may have something to say about annual events or anniversaries, as it takes the sun one year to wheel around us. The Moon and The Wheel: monthly cycles. The Star and the Wheel, it depends on what the surrounding cards suggest which star it is. If the Star is with cards that reinforce a Saturnian theme, then with The Wheel it speaks of a cycle of 30 years, if with cards that bring out its Mars qualities, two years.
If the Sun and Moon appear next to each other, perhaps this suggests a new Moon, a new start. If the Sun and Moon are opposite each other, this might suggest a full Moon, maturity, ripeness, maybe pregnancy. If the Moon lands to the left of the Sun, we might see it as a waxing influence indicating growth, progress, if to the right of the Sun it could be seen as a waning influence, decline, weakness.
There are so many more enriching ways to glean astrology in the Tarot, than the singular attribution of planet / sign = card.
Anyway, I've said my bit. Nice to know that there is another enthusiastic Tarotist around.
I look forward to the subsequent conversations on this thread. Cheers Jen.
Draco