The Golden Dawn or Thoth Method
Difficulty: Complicated
Note: Tarot decks that use reversed cards such as the Rider-Waite do not work well with this spread, which was designed to be read using elemental dignity.
The Golden Dawn spread is best suited for use with the bifrost Tarot and especially the Book of Thoth, as these decks are meant to be read a certain way with the court cards. Princes and queens represent actual men and women connected with the matter, while princesses generally represent ideas; thoughts or opinions, and knights represent arrival or departure of a matter depending on the direction faced.
In this tarot spread, particular attention should be paid to a card's exact position in relation to its neighbours. Whether the neighbour cards bear the same energy (suit) determines whether a card is considered well-dignified or ill-dignified. Opposite suits ill-dignify each other, while other suits are considered friendly. Tarot cards of the same suit or element strengthen each other.
As with other tarot spreads, it is important to count the cards' tendencies, such as whether there is a lot of one particular suit or number pattern. The patterns reveal special messages. Having several majors present indicates higher forces at work, several cups suggest strong emotions, etc.
Card #1 represents the reader and the nature of the topic at hand.
Cards #2 & #3 are read in extension of #1 to further comprehend the nature of the topic.
The two sets of three tarot cards at the top of the spread represent chronological sets of events. The current path as it would unfold naturally is represented by cards #4, #8, & #12. The alternate path that could be taken is represented by cards #13, #9, & #5. However, if the reader gets the feeling these cards are telling them they go together, then the alternate path is to be considered an extension of the current path, and to be read chronologically in this order: #4, #8, #12, #13, #9, #5. Just keep in mind: this is only if the two paths seem particularly similar.
Cards #14, #10, & #6 shed light upon the psychological undertones of the current issue.
Cards #7, #11, & #15 represent the influences of karma and destiny beyond the reader's control. These cards suggest adapting to this, as fate.
Your Golden Dawn Reading
| The Alternate Path (or Extension of Current Path) |
Your Current Path |
|||||
 9 of Pentacles |
 10 of Cups |
 8 of Cups |
 3 of Swords |
 Strength |
 Queen of Cups |
|
| The Querent | ||||||
 The Lovers |
 3 of Cups |
 10 of Swords |
||||
| The Psychological Basis | Karma | |||||
 Page of Wands |
 Queen of Pentacles |
 Ace of Swords |
 Judgement |
 Knight of Cups |
 3 of Wands |
|
The Querent
cards represent the querent and the nature of the topic at hand. The first card (in the center of the spread) represents the very core of the matter, and the other two cards around it are added to it in order to further comprehend the nature of the topic.
Maidens in a garden-ground with cups uplifted, as if pledging one another.
Divinatory Meaning:
The conclusion of any matter in plenty, perfection and merriment; happy issue, victory, fulfilment, solace, healing.
The sun shines in the zenith, and beneath is a great winged figure with arms extended, pouring down influences. In the foreground are two human figures, male and female, unveiled before each other, as if Adam and Eve when they first occupied the paradise of the earthly body. Behind the man is the Tree of Life, bearing twelve fruits, and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil is behind the woman; the serpent is twining round it. The figures suggest youth, virginity, innocence and love before it is contaminated by gross material desire. This is in all simplicity the card of human love, here exhibited as part of the way, the truth and the life. It replaces, by recourse to first principles, the old card of marriage, which I have described previously, and the later follies which depicted man between vice and virtue. In a very high sense, the card is a mystery of the Covenant and Sabbath.
The suggestion in respect of the woman is that she signifies that attraction towards the sensitive life which carries within it the idea of the Fall of Man, but she is rather the working of a Secret Law of Providence than a willing and conscious temptress. It is through her imputed lapse that man shall arise ultimately, and only by her can he complete himself. The card is therefore in its way another intimation concerning the great mystery of womanhood. The old meanings fall to pieces of necessity with the old pictures, but even as interpretations of the latter, some of them were of the order of commonplace and others were false in symbolism.
Divinatory Meaning:
Attraction, love, beauty, trials overcome.
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.
Your Current Path
cards represent your current path as it would unfold naturally. These cards are read in chronological order from left to right.
Three swords piercing a heart; cloud and rain behind.
Reversed Meaning:
Mental alienation, error, loss, distraction, disorder, confusion.
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.
Reversed Meaning:
Despotism, abuse of power, weakness, discord, sometimes even disgrace.
Beautiful, fair, dreamy – as one who sees visions in a cup. This is, however, only one of her aspects; she sees, but she also acts, and her activity feeds her dream.
Divinatory Meaning:
Good, fair woman; honest, devoted woman, who will do service to the Querent; loving intelligence, and hence the gift of vision; success, happiness, pleasure; also, wisdom, virtue; a perfect spouse and a good mother.
The Alternate Path
cards represent the alternate path that you could choose to take in lieu of the Current Path. However, if the cards that come up seem to indicate that they go along with the Current Path, these three cards should be interpretted not as an Alternate Path, but as a chronological extension of the Current Path (also read from left to right).
A woman, with a bird upon her wrist, stands amidst a great abundance of grapevines in the garden of a manorial house. It is a wide domain, suggesting plenty in all things. Possibly it is her own possession and testifies to material well-being.
Divinatory Meaning:
Prudence, safety, success, accomplishment, certitude, discernment.
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.
A man of dejected aspect is deserting the cups of his felicity, enterprise, undertaking or previous concern.
Divinatory Meaning:
The card speaks for itself on the surface, but other readings are entirely antithetical – giving joy, mildness, timidity, honour, modesty. In practice, it is usually found that the card shews the decline of a matter, or that a matter which has been thought to be important is really of slight consequence – either for good or evil.
The Psychological Basis
cards shed light upon the psychological undertones of the current problem.
In a scene similar to the former, a young man stands in the act of proclamation. He is unknown but faithful, and his tidings are strange.
Divinatory Meaning:
Dark young man, faithful, a lover, an envoy, a postman. Beside a man, he will bear favourable testimony concerning him. A dangerous rival, if followed by the Page of Cups. Has the chief qualities of his suit. He may signify family intelligence.
The face suggests that of a dark woman, whose qualities might be summed up in the idea of greatness of soul; she has also the serious cast of intelligence; she contemplates her symbol and may see worlds therein.
Reversed Meaning:
Evil, suspicion, suspense, fear, mistrust.
A hand issues from a cloud, grasping as word, the point of which is encircled by a crown.
Reversed Meaning:
The same, but the results are disastrous; another account says – conception, childbirth, augmentation, multiplicity.
Karma
These cards represent the influences of karma and destiny that are beyond your control. They suggest adapting to this fate.
The great angel is here encompassed by clouds, but he blows his bannered trumpet, and the cross as usual is displayed on the banner. The dead are rising from their tombs – a woman on the right, a man on the left hand, and between them their child, whose back is turned. But in this card there are more than three who are restored, and it has been thought worthwhile to make this variation as illustrating the insufficiency of current explanations. It should be noted that all the figures are as one in the wonder, adoration and ecstasy expressed by their attitudes. It is the card which registers the accomplishment of the great work of transformation in answer to the summons of the Supernal – which summons is heard and answered from within.
Herein is the intimation of a significance which cannot well be carried further in the present place. What is that within us which does sound a trumpet and all that is lower in our nature rises in response – almost in a moment, almost in the twinkling of an eye? Let the card continue to depict, for those who can see no further, the Last judgment and the resurrection in the natural body; but let those who have inward eyes look and discover therewith. They will understand that it has been called truly in the past a card of eternal life, and for this reason it may be compared with that which passes under the name of Temperance.
Divinatory Meaning:
Change of position, renewal, outcome. Another account specifies total loss though lawsuit.
Graceful, but not warlike; riding quietly, wearing a winged helmet, referring to those higher graces of the imagination which sometimes characterise this card. He too is a dreamer, but the images of the side of sense haunt him in his vision.
Divinatory Meaning:
Arrival, approach – sometimes that of a messenger; advances, proposition, demeanour, invitation, incitement.
A calm, stately personage, with his back turned, looking from a cliff's edge at ships passing over the sea. Three staves are planted in the ground, and he leans slightly on one of them.
Divinatory Meaning:
He symbolises established strength, enterprise, effort, trade, commerce, discovery; those are his ships, bearing his merchandise, which are sailing over the sea. The card also signifies able co-operation in business, as if the successful merchant prince were looking from his side towards yours with a view to help you.
