The Chariot and Temperance of Tarot

Visual connections, numbers and esoteric meanings

Both cards show a same road or centered tunnel. The figure’s torso in The Chariot is wide or narrow. If considered wide, it’s the white background’s opening. It seems like a home’s or building’s façade. From the entrance displayed in front of the reader, it can be appreciated the first area inside, just after like entering into a kind of a woman’s hips, rounded and V –shaped, converging in the lower area.

The legs, absent on a card outside the Earth. Two wheels at both sides start motion, turning in a clockwise sky, in the same direction. Motion leads to a dark and white field, with all colors not visible yet, populated with spheres seeming eggs.

If the torso is narrow, the ocher color in the chest seems to be the cause. It comes from Men, from the knowledge of the star in the forehead. The cause continues downwards as an inner white background, is poured into it, falls among the others, populates.

The only sword at one side starts an action, is the conquest of the intention (in the Aquarian Tarot, the tip downwards means right position). In this beginning, beyond, there’s a man-woman for the triumphant life.

The visual image of the centered matrix is repeated in the feminine figure. Giving a winged and angelical first impression, now the road is warmer, protected, productive. On Earth, something will decant beneath feathers, below. Later, we should visualize the world and the four directions, along with the fixated zodiacal corners. Card 21, The World of the bull, the lion, the phoenix and the eagle, has not been included here. It’s not necessary in order to go with the vital flow indicated by major ones.

They are part of three-card groups, with 7 phases or cards among each arcane. Then, their numbers alternately refer to 3, 6 or 9: each person as a product, link, humankind:

• I + VIII + XV = 24 (6);
• II + IX + XVI = 27 (9);
• III + X + XVII = 30 (3)…

3–6–9, as a numeric series, provides a common subject for three-card groups, pointing to the cause (1), the effect (2) and the product (3). Later, the same product will be the cause, too, the son of the son on Earth. For instance, the group 7–14–21 shows:

• the intention being poured, oneself (7), who has been a product too (3) and now is the cause (1),
• the union of two during pregnancy (14), which is a couple (6) and is the effect of the cause (2),
• everybody’s life as a reproduction (21), which is humankind (9) and a final totality itself (3).

But, besides continuities, there are groups formed by differences, too. They emerge when esoteric processes and events come into manifestation, in the colors of matter under the atmosphere, in daily life nuances. Inside of life as a circle, and along with the very cards sequence as a flow, the first folding of life or semicircle gathers cards in pairs, or material extremes.

When those cards are gathered, extremes are united, the dense disappears, is transcended. Their numbers always sum 21 and, again, point to number 3, a product:

• 0 + XXI = 3;
• I + XX = 21 (3);
• II + XIX = 21 (3)…

IV — XVII. The Emperor rules the world of mundane forms. The phoenix in The Star flies to the sky above, and will rule from there (in other decks, we usually find a naked woman instead of a bird, as she detaches from material possessions).

X — XI. The Wheel of Fortune is speculation, chance, a turn in circumstances, luck and effects on material ownership. Justice (replaced by Force in other decks) is law imposition, balance and equity.

In a vital representation, a product always emerges from material conditions (groups of two). In those groups, all cards are concrete and mundane:

Eleven esoteric subjects in paired Tarot’s major cards (cards distributed to make it easier to see opposite meanings). Each card is related to extreme states, processes or actions to the other card inside of the same subject. A turn in one subject changes states, processes and actions in the other subjects: a single spread always includes all major cards as a whole.

But when a product becomes a cause and starts its own esoteric series of three cards, the action comes from the immaterial sphere, remaining invisible to the querent’s physical senses. For instance:

IV — XI — XVIII. Ruling the world is the cause for ordering. The ways of the ruler have a mandatory effect. Rulership and law produce a legacy, inheritance, continuity in others, in further times, or the chance to preserve a lively world, populated. Cards to meditate on: The Magician — The Emperor (cause), The Priestess — Justice (effect), The Empress — Moon (product).

III — X — XVII. The very products, what is fertile, are the cause to make a move, of material losses and earnings, of mutual actions and reactions. The fertile cycle will eventually decay, and life will leave this world of earthly forms, like the phoenix (Scorpio). Cards to meditate on: The Magician — The Empress (cause), The Priestess — The Wheel of Fortune (effect), The Empress — The Star (product).

In the examples above, it can be appreciated that, inside of the vital perspective on Tarot cards, physical death is more related to The Star than to Death (which is paired with Strength, across the axis of hardness — change relative to solidity; in other decks, Strength is replaced by Justice).

The group of three cards initiated by The Empress turns around the subject of fertile cycles, and opens the door to reincarnationist readings for those looking for that view. Whereas The Fool, who doesn’t add a value, who is out of series, is the empty space making the wheel turn and starting the game of life in motion. The card is paired with The World (solitude — community, irrationality — common sense, chaos — living together), and precedes The Chariot in the 7-phase sequence. Group VII — XIV — XXI, about the intention to populate, has meaningless as the last cause.

Each group of three cards has its own last cause. Inside of the group about fertility, the last cause to The Empress is Moon, or the chance of a matrix to produce. Whereas inside of the group turning around the subject of development and control (The Magician — Strength — The Devil), the last cause is the destruction in The Tower, followed later by the magical arts of the creator.

Anyway, an esoteric Tarot reading always refers to all subjects, directly or indirectly. Each one of them is displayed with a different emphasis, and they are not exclusive to any particular group since they refer to vital circumstances. A single spread always includes the whole circle of life, pointing to connections between cycles, situations, activities and events that only become visible from an esoteric point of view.

This article was inspired by Los Enamorados y El Diablo en el Tarot, by Hilda Duarte Vergara, published on Medium too (Spanish language). The article associates The Lovers with The Devil, two paired cards in the material experience.

If you’re interested in the esoteric and vital perspective on Tarot, there are two series of articles freely distributed by the consultancy: Compared Tarot and Astrological Tarot (the latter one about the Egyptian deck). The full list of series is on the website.

I’m also available for private readings, live performances (only in Buenos Aires City) and the online Tarot course to start at any time of the year. If you want to get in contact, leave a comment here or send a private message.