Horse Shoe Spread

 

 

Difficulty: Easy

The Horse Shoe is a classic tarot spread. It is more advanced than the three-card reading, yet simpler than most other spreads. It is a versatile method that can be used for most queries, though there are other spreads which would go into more depth. Like the simple Past, Present, and Future spread, it contains these cards in positions #1, #2, and #7, but also has four other tarot cards that help the reader understand how to deal with the future better. The cards are to be read as follows:

1. The Past: Past events affecting the question.
2. The Present: The current state or approaching influence.
3. Hidden Influences: Things the reader may not be aware of (or barely be aware of).
4. Obstacles: This is the challenge: obstacles may be avoided or may have to be dealt with.
5. External Influences: Attitudes and thoughts regarding people around the reader.
6. Suggestions: Recommended course of action.
7. Outcome: The result of following the suggestions.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Your Horse Shoe Reading

	Obstacle Page of Cups
Hidden Influences The Lovers		External Influences The High Priestess
The Present Page of Swords		Suggestion Ace of Cups
The Past Ace of Swords		The Outcome 10 of Wands

 

 

 

 

The Past represents past events that are affecting the question.

 

Ace of Swords

A hand issues from a cloud, grasping as word, the point of which is encircled by a crown.

Divinatory Meaning:

Triumph, the excessive degree in everything, conquest, triumph of force. It is a card of great force, in love as well as in hatred. The crown may carry a much higher significance than comes usually within the sphere of fortune-telling.

 

 

 

 

The Present represents the current state or immediately approaching influence.

 

Page of Swords

A lithe, active figure holds a sword upright in both hands, while in the act of swift walking. He is passing over rugged land, and about his way the clouds are collocated wildly. He is alert and lithe, looking this way and that, as if an expected enemy might appear at any moment.

Divinatory Meaning:

Authority, overseeing, secret service, vigilance, spying, examination, and the qualities thereto belonging.

 

 

 

 

Hidden Influences - Things that you may not be aware of, or barely be aware of.

 

The Lovers

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.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Obstacle - This is the challenge.

 

Page of Cups

A fair, pleasing, somewhat effeminate page, of studious and intent aspect, contemplates a fish rising from a cup to look at him. It is the pictures of the mind taking form.

Divinatory Meaning:

Fair young man, one impelled to render service and with whom the Querent will be connected; a studious youth; news, message; application, reflection, meditation; also, these things directed to business.

 

 

 

 

External Influences - Attitudes about this situation from people around the querent.

 

The High Priestess

She has the lunar crescent at her feet, a horned diadem on her head, with a globe in the middle place, and a large solar cross on her breast. The scroll in her hands is inscribed with the word Tora, signifying the Greater Law, the Secret Law and the second sense of the Word. It is partly covered by her mantle, to shew that some things are implied and some spoken. She is seated between the white and black pillars – J. and B. – of the mystic Temple, and the veil of the Temple is behind her: it is embroidered with palms and pomegranates. The vestments are flowing and gauzy, and the mantle suggests light – a shimmering radiance. She has been called occult Science on the threshold of the Sanctuary of Isis, but she is really the Secret Church, the House which is of God and man. She represents also the Second Marriage of the Prince who is no longer of this world; she is the spiritual Bride and Mother, the daughter of the stars and the Higher Garden of Eden. She is, in fine, the Queen of the borrowed light, but this is the light of all. She is the Moon nourished by the milk of the Supernal Mother.

In a manner, she is also the Supernal Mother herself – that is to say, she is the bright reflection. It is in this sense of reflection that her truest and highest name in bolism is Shekinah – the co-habiting glory. According to Kabalism, there is a Shekinah both above and below. In the superior world it is called Binah, the Supernal Understanding which reflects to the emanations that are beneath. In the lower world it is MaIkuth – that world being, for this purpose, understood as a blessed Kingdom that with which it is made blessed being the Indwelling Glory. Mystically speaking, the Shekinah is the Spiritual Bride of the just man, and when he reads the Law she gives the Divine meaning. There are some respects in which this card is the highest and holiest of the Greater Arcana.

Divinatory Meaning:

Secrets, mystery, the future as yet unrevealed; the woman who interests the Querent, if male; the Querent herself, if female; silence, tenacity; mystery, wisdom, science.

 

 

 

 

Suggestion - The recommended course of action.

 

Ace of Cups

The waters are beneath, and thereon are water-lilies; the hand issues from the cloud, holding in its palm the cup, from which four streams are pouring; a dove, bearing in its bill a cross-marked Host, descends to place the Wafer in the Cup; the dew of water is falling on all sides. It is an intimation of that which may lie behind the Lesser Arcana.

Divinatory Meaning:

House of the true heart, joy, content, abode, nourishment, abundance, fertility; Holy Table, felicity hereof.

 

 

 

 

The Outcome - What will happen if the suggestion is followed.

 

10 of Wands

A man oppressed by the weight of the ten staves which he is carrying.

Reversed Meaning:

Contrarieties, difficulties, intrigues, and their analogies.