The Fool asks — Am I in control of what’s happening? Or are other forces at work? Does it matter?
Modern tarotists sometimes relate the Fool to the planet Uranus, but in the era in which we first know that Tarot existed, this was impossible, since no one yet knew Uranus the planet existed. Only seven planets were named. Back then it’s believed the Fool may have corresponded to the Air element.
While the mental or airy nature of the King of Swords may be seen as the mastery of, or complete focus of the powers of the mind, as the ultimate in mental discipline, in fact ultimate mastery of the mind may very well belong to the Fool. Not only is the Fool so focused, on one hand, that he’s oblivious to the dangers around him or to the possible folly of his path. He’s also, on the other hand, able to let go of instinctive control, of his survival needs, just as a mad man or an innocent child might. He may also do this with full conscious intent, in order to let go, fall, create, risk, imagine, and explore inner and outer realms with absolute freedom. He embodies conscious and unconscious focus, as well as conscious and unconscious abandon. He has few attachments to the material world — only the ragged or comical clothing he wears, his knapsack, and possibly an animal guide. He could conceivably be a shamanic kind of healer, willing to enter another plane of existence without fear, with his trusty animal guide there to pull him back into our reality when his work is done. At his most powerful, the Fool can be all these things or none. He can be an error in thinking, a blunder. He can be a surprise.
He’s one aspect of the Trickster.
While many tarotists place the Fool at the beginning of the major arcana, as number zero, in fact zero isn’t a beginning at all. It is no thing. In some of the earliest known Tarots, the Visconti, none of the major arcana were numbered. When they later were ordered and numbered, the Fool remained unnumbered. Where in the series of 22 cards would one place this being who seemed to exist out of time, outside the material world, even outside the social classes? On one hand he’s a beggar, an idiot, a mad man. He matters not to the ordered classes. On the other he’s the court jester, the only one who can make fun of the King or Emperor without fear of losing his life. He also has the King’s ear and might sometimes whisper words of wisdom of the kind only a child might utter, or deliver news that no one else dare. He’s a truth teller, for isn’t that what makes a good joke, a humorous illustration of truth? So he must remain of no account, as one who will never be taken seriously.
The Fool may be a “natural fool” or a “licensed fool.”
Today, instead of court jesters we have comedians who point out the flaws of our leaders — and who don’t seem to take sides in their truth telling. Every leader seems to fall subject to their jests.
Many a family has a child like this, one who will tell family truths, truths the family doesn’t want told, who is therefore cast into the role of no-account by becoming the family scapegoat. In a dysfunctional family this role is sometimes relegated to one child. In some families the role is shared. It gets changed off from one member to another, from one time or circumstance to another. Perhaps even a parent takes a turn at being the scapegoat/truth teller.
The Fool is also the Child in all of us, the Child archetype that Jung and others have sometimes called the Divine Child and considered important as a symbol in dreams.
The Fool can be seen as both the beginning and the end of one’s journey. One starts life as an infant, a child, an innocent who knows no good or evil. Vulnerable, unlearned, unconscious, the child looks at the world and life with his eyes wide with wonder. Toward the end of life, if one is fortunate, one may reach the other end of the journey with a new kind of Fool-like awareness, an ability to see beyond good and evil, to recognize them as merely light and shadow, both necessary for balance. The Fool may have a sage-like wisdom that knows no boundaries and sees beyond our material existence. The Child Fool may be fearless because he’s innocent of danger. The Sage Fool understands danger and realizes he need not fear it. He moves through his fear with awareness.
This past week’s card was the Death card, number XIII. In many older Tarot decks, the Fool wasn’t numbered, and card XIII was never named.
Many Death cards depict a skeleton wielding a scythe as it mows down kings, clergymen, rich and poor, powerful and lowly alike, thus portraying La Mort as the great equalizer. In some decks, Death is portrayed as a cloaked figure with a scythe riding a pale horse through fog, storm clouds, or a desolate landscape. Again, the dead strewn across the landscape are people from all ranks of life.
In movies, the Death card usually predicts an actual death, much to the disappointment of Tarot users who’ve tired of that stereotype. While XIII Death can indicate physical death, several other Tarot cards can too, and that’s not the Death card’s usual interpretation. The image in the card is a symbolic representation of an archetype, a typical process that humans experience in many forms besides physical death. But the stereotypical meaning, taking the symbolic representation as literal death, is what many people think of when they first see the Death card. It’s scary to them because they’ve learned to fear death. It makes Tarot appear to them to be full of evil portent and curses, when in fact it’s a great tool for introspection and self-understanding.
XIII Death reminds us that all things come full circle, much like the hands on a clock, from beginning to end — and in the end is an inherent fresh beginning. Death as a physical transition from this life is natural in that it comes to all living things. We fear it because of its unknown aspects, such as when it will happen, how, whether we’ll be prepared or feel that we have too many loose ends left in our lives. We may fear that we’ll have tasks, lessons, goals, or adventures left unfinished — or relationships we don’t want to split apart, even temporarily. We may have regrets that haunt us and remain unresolved. Then there’s the inevitable question of an afterlife. Is there one? What will ours be like? We also fear it because it’s out of our control, and in our modern world we like control. We insist upon it.
Some of us resist death as if we could cheat it, or be the one person it somehow passes by. Some seem to do the opposite and rush toward it by courting danger. Others unconsciously invite death by way of dangerous habits, or apathy. We sometimes borrow a little death by fearing it.
In Tarot, the Death card rarely indicates the end of physical life, so its appearance in a reading shouldn’t be frightening. It usually indicates other kinds of transitions. It’s the inevitability of these changes that seems to be most consistent, with this card, and that’s how its meaning most resembles physical death. One is faced with the inevitable. One must change.
There are many kinds of change that are as inevitable, irresistible, and irrevocable as death. A few examples are the end of childhood, the end of pregnancy in the relentless throes of labor, the need to move on from a spent relationship, leaving a job that no longer suits us — or no longer exists. It’s usually an expected change, one that on some level we knew would come eventually. Perhaps we’ve put off preparing for it, hoping it wouldn’t. Resisting such change is futile, and in many cases will make matters worse or prolong someone’s suffering. It’s best to let go as gracefully as possible, allowing the remains to feed the future and the resulting emptiness to be filled with something new and perhaps better, fresher, more vital, more timely. We can’t see what that might be, and that makes it all the harder to let go. In this regard it’s more like a stalled or prolonged grieving process than death itself.
I sometimes think of this card as the Tarot’s recycling center, or compost heap, because it represents the kinds of endings that are also beginnings, whether we can see or believe in them or not. The remaining energy is best put to other uses.
As each day ends and we retire for the night, most of us do so in the knowledge or faith that a new day will soon dawn. But worry can make the dawn seem a long ways off. It’s in resisting the unknown and inevitable change, in worrying over them as if that worry could somehow thwart them, that we kill ourselves, by refusing to move forward in life, to be present as we meet our future.
The Death card is as much about internal change — life lessons or phases, and how we process them — as it is about external matters. The change might take place inside us, completely unseen by others except as it alters our outlook and behavior. It can be as mundane a change as, “Vacation’s over; time to get back to work.” Although the Death card always requires an adjustment, it’s never a reason to panic. What good would panic do, even if it was an indicator of death? There are more constructive ways to meet the future.
Copyright © 2009 Barbara W. Klaser. All rights reserved.
2009 Tarot Study Index
The Twos in Tarot can be dualistic, bipolar, two-faced, and filled with conflict or tension. They can push or pull in two directions, or unite somewhere in the middle in a tense, semi-structured and semi-permanent balance. Their energy can also build to a release point that will occur in the Threes.
Going back to Gail Fairfield’s geometric analogy, Two is two points connecting to form a line. Remember back to Geometry class, the abstract notion that a line extends into infinity in both directions, and you have an idea of the potential of the Twos in Tarot — especially the most prominent Two in the deck, the Papess or High Priestess. (more…)
