Decision Spread
Difficulty: Easy
This simple but highly useful spread calls for a question to be asked in this format:
'What happens if I do (X), and what happens if I do not do (X)?'
Please note that it should not be viewed as a decision between two different options, but about whether a single option should be exercised or not. A second option would call for a separate reading.
Card #7 is the significator, the overall theme of the query.
Cards #3, #1, & #5 represent the chronological sequence of events that occurs if the reader chooses to do (X).
Cards #4, #2, & #6 represent the chronological sequence of events that unfolds if the reader chooses not to do (X).
Your Decision Reading
The Significator Strength |
Outcome if you do it: | ||
 8 of Swords |
 10 of Cups |
 2 of Wands |
|
| Outcome if you don't do it: | |||
 10 of Swords |
 Knight of Pentacles |
 The Hermit |
|
Strength
A woman, over whose head there broods the same symbol of life which we have seen in the card of the Magician, is closing the jaws of a lion. The only point in which this design differs from the conventional presentations is that her beneficent fortitude has already subdued the lion, which is being led by a chain of flowers. For reasons which satisfy myself, this card has been interchanged with that of justice, which is usually numbered eight. As the variation carries nothing with it which will signify to the reader, there is no cause for explanation. Fortitude, in one of its most exalted aspects, is connected with the Divine Mystery of Union; the virtue, of course, operates in all planes, and hence draws on all in its symbolism. It connects also with innocentia inviolata, and with the strength which resides in contemplation.
These higher meanings are, however, matters of inference, and I do not suggest that they are transparent on the surface of the card. They are intimated in a concealed manner by the chain of flowers, which signifies, among many other things, the sweet yoke and the light burden of Divine Law, when it has been taken into the heart of hearts. The card has nothing to do with self-confidence in the ordinary sense, though this has been suggested – but it concerns the confidence of those whose strength is God, who have found their refuge in Him. There is one aspect in which the lion signifies the passions, and she who is called Strength is the higher nature in its liberation. It has walked upon the asp and the basilisk and has trodden down the lion and the dragon.
Divinatory Meaning:
Power, energy, action, courage, magnanimity; also, complete success and honours.
Outcome if you do it:
8 of Swords
A woman, bound and hoodwinked, with the swords of the card about her. Yet it is rather a card of temporary durance than of irretrievable bondage.
Reversed Meaning:
Disquiet, difficulty, opposition, accident, treachery; what is unforeseen; fatality.
10 of Cups
Appearance of Cups in a rainbow; it is contemplated in wonder and ecstasy by a man and woman below, evidently husband and wife. His right arm is about her; his left is raised upward; she raises her right arm. The two children dancing near them have not observed the prodigy but are happy after their own manner. There is a home-scene beyond.
Reversed Meaning:
Repose of the false heart, indignation, violence.
2 of Wands
A tall man looks from a battlemented roof over sea and shore; he holds a globe in his right hand, while a staff in his left rests on the battlement; another is fixed in a ring. The Rose and Cross and Lily should be noticed on the left side.
Divinatory Meaning:
Between the alternative readings there is no marriage possible; on the one hand, riches, fortune, magnificence; on the other, physical suffering, disease, chagrin, sadness, mortification. The design gives one suggestion; here is a lord overlooking his dominion and alternately contemplating a globe; it looks like the malady, the mortification, the sadness of Alexander amidst the grandeur of this world's wealth.
A young lady may expect trivial disappointments.
Outcome if you do not do it:
10 of Swords
A prostrate figure, pierced by all the swords belonging to the card.
Reversed Meaning:
Advantage, profit, success, favour, but none of these are permanent; also, power and authority.
Knight of Pentacles
He rides a slow, enduring, heavy horse, to which his own aspect corresponds. He exhibits his symbol, but does not look therein.
Divinatory Meaning:
Utility, serviceableness, interest, responsibility, rectitude – all on the normal and external plane.
The Hermit
The variation from the conventional models in this card is only that the lamp is not enveloped partially in the mantle of its bearer, who blends the idea of the Ancient of Days with the Light of the World It is a star which shines in the lantern. I have said that this is a card of attainment, and to extend this conception the figure is seen holding up his beacon on an eminence. Therefore, the Hermit is not, as Court de Gebelin explained, a wise man in search of truth and justice; nor is he, as a later explanation proposes, an especial example of experience. His beacon intimates that – where I am, you also may be.
It is further a card which is understood quite incorrectly when it is connected with the idea of occult isolation, as the protection of personal magnetism against admixture. This is one of the frivolous renderings which we owe to Eliphas Levi. It has been adopted by the French Order of Martinism and some of us have heard a great deal of the Silent and Unknown Philosophy enveloped by his mantle from the knowledge of the profane. In true Martinism, the significance of the term Philosophe inconnu was of another order. It did not refer to the intended concealment of the Instituted Mysteries, much less of their substitutes, but – like the card itself – to the truth that the Divine Mysteries secure their own protection from those who are unprepared.
Reversed Meaning:
Concealment, disguise, policy, fear, unreasoned caution.
