Major Arcana

The phrase Major Arcana means ‘the greatest secret’ or ‘the greatest mystery’.

The major arcana cards numbered 0 to 21 (22 cards) represent a journey from the fresh start of The Fool card to the complete mastery of The World card. To understand the Major Arcana means understanding what this journey is and what it represents. Before that, we need to look at a major building block of the journey (and a major building block of the Tarot deck itself); archetypes.

To learn more about Archetypes and the psychological theory behind them see this Torch-Tarot Article.

Archetypes in Torch-Tarot

Archetypes are crucially important in the use of divination using Tarot today, and the Torch deck uses only archetypes.

For example, the Ace cards and The Wheel of Fortune (that are often totally symbolic in other decks) use archetypes as their main subject in this deck.

But how do archetypes map to the journey seen within the Major Arcana? Surely there must be a corresponding archetypal journey?

The Archetypal Journey

As well as concentrating on archetypes, another basic premise of the Major Arcana in Torch-Tarot is if the Tarot is based on archetypes then the journey the Major Arcana shows must also be archetypal. The key to understanding the Major Arcana is identifying this story.

If the Tarot is based on archetypes then the journey the Major Arcana shows must also be archetypal

Ancient myth and our oldest stories and fairy tales follow a common structure irrespective of culture and geographical source.

As the ancient myths are our oldest stories, they will be the closest visible remains of the archetypal journey within our subconscious, and this is the root archetypal story.

This structure is called the Monomyth or Hero’s Journey, and once you realize that archetypes are the core building blocks of it, the Hero’s journey maps beautifully to the Tarot Major Arcana.

Jung’s Mind model that uses archetypes is proven by the number of common use cases that rely on it being correct (such as personality systems including Myers-Briggs) and make it is falsifiable (which is an important property for anything that is provable). Similarly, The Hero’s Journey/monomyth is used as a framework in ancient myth, common literature and more recently, movies. It also forms an interesting and widely accepted tool in understanding ancient religions and creation stories. Thus all assumptions made in the Torch-Tarot have some level of practical proof as they are in common use today.

In summary, the Hero’s (or Heroine’s, or Fool’s) journey begins in the Ordinary World. In mythic arcs and modern story plots, this represents the ‘world as it is’.

A call to action occurs that begins the journey. Inertia or disbelief often causes the Hero to be initially reluctant to act, and an event occurs to make the call more compelling. The Hero may also meet a mentor or guide who will help them on their journey.

The Hero now moves out of their Ordinary World and into the Special World of the journey. Upon crossing the threshold between the two worlds, they may meet an obstacle or ‘threshold guardian’.

After the guardian, there is no quick return back to the Ordinary World, as you reach a one-way section of the journey. This is often called Into the belly of the whale. You enter a distinct area that looks nothing like the Ordinary World and it represents a point of no return. In Torch-Tarot this is represented by the leap of the Fool. Once you take the leap, you can never go back the way you came.

The first half the journey into the Special world is a one-way descent or fall. The Hero goes through a series of trials, meeting allies and enemies along the way. At the end of this sequence the Hero enters the darkest area of the Special World where the most arduous ordeal yet has to be overcome. This battle results in a death and rebirth of the Hero. She transforms from the non-Hero we met in the Ordinary World and is reborn as someone who can complete the quest.

After the descent to the Ordeal we have the beginning of the upward journey towards final resolution. The Hero has proven her worth and is rewarded with a boon, weapon, or secret knowledge that will protect them later. As they leave the special world and re-enter the Ordinary World they may meet and have to deal with another threshold guardian (in movies this is often the point where we see the ubiquitous car chase or big action sequence!).

Once the Hero gets past this, we see a final battle, epiphany or change of state that signifies the Hero has won. This often results in a resurrection of the Hero in her final form. She is now ready to fulfill the task she initially set out to do at the beginning. The resurrection may require some of the allies and boon she collected along the way, making the journey psychologically complete.

The final stage of the story arc is the completion. The Hero now has the thing that makes the Ordinary World complete again (or in more personal journeys, we have a completion of the Hero within that world; she did not fit before but she now finds her place in the world). This is denoted by the elixir, that can be the weapon, the boon, or even the allies she gained along the way and this solves the initial problem that caused the journey. In the best stories the elixir is the thing the hero started with; herself, but the ordeal and resurrection has changed her. In Tarot this change is often seen to be spiritual enlightenment but in everyday life it could be anything: attaining a new skillset, a change in life or career, or a new relationship.

Mapping the Hero’s Journey to the Major Arcana

Identifying your Hero’s Archetypes

The Hero/Heroine is represented as the Fool, Magician and high Priestess. These symbolize the three facets of any significant journey we make.

The Fool represents the enthusiasm, curiosity and change represented by the journey, and the Fool card itself depicts the early part of the story arc (leaving the Ordinary World by breaking the links that shackle the Hero to it).

The Magician represents the physical and mental part of the journey: gaining talents and skills, and finding new truths from the outer world, discovering secrets from it, and changing the external world.

The High Priestess represents the inner part of the journey. As well as any physical journey, the best stories and myths contains a subtext of inner growth, character building and self-realization. These come from your inner self rather than from the outer world.

The Ordinary World

The ordinary world is not just a starting position in the Hero’s journey. It is the place that created you or the problem you face. Some of it will have been absorbed by you and will be taken forward as archetypes during the journey.

There are three parts to this absorbed influence: the feminine/mother, the masculine/father and the society and its structures that inform you. The archetypes at work here are the next three cards in the Major Arcana: the Empress, the Emperor and the Hierophant. Like the previous three cards that make up you as the Hero, they may work for you or against you during your journey.

The upright cards represent the archetypes that form your mentor for your journey and the reversed cards are the threshold guardian that will try to keep you from moving forward to the special world.

Allies, Enemies and Trials

The next six cards in the Major Arcana represent the trials, enemies and allies you will meet. Will you gain companions, a sense of direction, inner strength, knowledge, or a sense of justice, and will lady luck be with you?

Two important events that may occur during the trials are Meeting with the Goddess and Atonement with the Father.

The first is associated with a positive and supportive feminine force that gives love and guidance. There may be a test requiring strength of personality and good motivation before it is granted.

The second is more of a challenge – confronting or reconnecting with a powerful or authoritative figure that may involve facing fears and overcoming inner obstacles to do with ego.

If either are passed, the result moves the Hero forward. Reversed, they may point to a hurdle or deeper issue that remains to be addressed at a later stage (and may even be an underlying shadow-archetype issue that causes the journey in the first place).

Ordeal/Death and Rebirth

After the trials comes the ordeal. This is the lowest point of the descent/leap and the Hero dies here. This is usually a spiritual death followed by a rebirth. The Hero cannot continue without this rebirth.

Before this point the main character is a Hero in name only, but after the rebirth they gain qualities that actually make them a Hero, or at least someone capable of completing the journey.

The Hanged Man and Death card look likely candidates for a rebirth but the Devil and Tower card, not so much, and Temperance stands out as being a much brighter and upbeat card than the others. There seems nothing common to them at all!

The similarity between all five cards is they cause or suggest significant change. You have to experience deep change to move beyond them and this change causes the rebirth.

After this point the arc now moves to an ascent back up. The hero has finally become a hero and is now ready for the final acts and true heroism.

Reward/Seizing the Sword

After the trials and rebirth comes the reward. This is often called ‘seizing the sword’, referring to a physical manifestation of the hero’s newfound strength. This is not always the case though. This ‘sword’ can be knowing a deeper truth or a greater self-awareness, or a newfound emotional need to succeed. In Hollywood films where everything is bigger, it is often all of the above!

The next three cards refer to this reward: The Star, The Moon and The Sun. All three are visible as the hero looks up to the sky during her ascent, but they also point to the three types of reward:

• The Star refers to ‘the universe finally on your side’. The figure on the card, the Goddess Hebe is the personification of Youth and her magical boon is youthfulness. Although some myths point to a fountain of youth or a magical cauldron of plenty, in Greek myth this fountain is the Goddess herself and we see this in the card. The water from the Goddess passes through the rays of the star and nourishes an old and dead tree stump back to life. The reversed card suggests a point of great despair and failure that the Hero has to move through by bringing up inner reserves. This points to a harder journey forward.
• The Moon gives us a different gift: self-awareness or a deeper intuition of the world around. The gift of the moon may reveal a secret that can be put to use: a plan based on a critical flaw in the enemy (as happens in Star Wars when we see a chink in the armor of the Death Star) or a new understanding of the rules (as occurs in the Matrix, when Neo learns how to control and understand the world of the Matrix via an ability to bend its reality). The reversed Moon is however very problematic. The Hero may find cause to question her own motivations or the antagonist gains the upper hand by learning a secret or two to use against the hero!
• Finally, the Sun gives a similar boon as the Star but it manifests not as youth but as raw energy via the positive power of the Sun. This may manifest as the power of a group who have worked separately so far but now come together to form a power greater than the sum of their parts. The hero herself could have become more powerful or represent a focus that others finally rally around (as the hero represents an idea that the world was waiting for; the villain in the story might actually now be beatable). Reversed it may cause a dissolution and loss of energy that may seem like failure but actually causes a harder journey but also self-reliance and true inner will to move forward. This happens towards the end of the Lord of the Rings where the final and most dangerous part of the journey to destroy the ring falls on the two seemingly weakest and least prepared characters. Yet hard circumstances creates strength of character. In the final moments this strength beats evil's self-motivation and greed.

Resurrection

The resurrection is perhaps a misunderstood part of the journey. There is no death-rebirth here but the final culmination of what has happened so far. The hero has already been reborn but now we see the physical manifestation of the hero’s newfound power being used.

In many ways, this is not really a resurrection so much as a judgement of what the hero has gone through so far. Is she ready to take the final challenge? Is she good enough to vanquish evil? Has she learned the right things?

We finally find out at this point. A major obstacle acts as a final test or judgement. Unlike the Hero’s journey, the Major Arcana has the naming of this step dead right…

Return with the Elixir

The final act in the Hero’s journey is to return to the Ordinary World with the ‘elixir’, or the thing that solves the original reason for the journey. In many action movies, this is a completion after the final battle of the main story. In more complex stories involving an inner journey resulting in changes to the Hero, it can be a time of contemplation. In either case, it underlines the final victory.

The hero is now master of both worlds: the Ordinary World and the Special World. She has returned with knowledge of both. On the Torch-Tarot World card we see this graphically via the Goddess of victory, Nike. She is situated literally between two worlds with the physical earth below her and the heavens above her.

Our hero has certainly earned her wings.

Reading your own Hero’s Journey

The Torch-Tarot deck has been designed to be usable as a standard Tarot deck but can also be used to apply the archetypal Hero’s Journey to your more important questions and life-challenges. To do this, separate out the Major Arcana from the rest of the deck and shuffle them (noting that shuffle in Tarot means randomizing the card order and the upright/reverses!), and follow the techniques noted below.

Note that the Hero’s Journey spread is large and should generally be used for long term questions with a time frame of 6 months to a year. You would not do it daily as most big adventures are not completed in a day!

Place the following cards into separate shuffled piles.

• Fool, Magician, High Priestess, Judgement and World (the ‘beginning’ and ‘end’, 5 cards)
• Empress, Empress, Hierophant (the ‘ordinary world’, three cards)
• Cards 6-11 (the ‘trials’, 6 cards)
• Cards 12-16 (the ‘ordeal’, 5 cards)
• Cards 17-19 (the ‘reward’, 3 cards)

Lay each pile into a row as shown, in the order they are listed above. That’s a lot of cards (the entire Major Arcana!) but don’t worry – we only use some of them.

Note that the instructions relate to preparing a reading for someone else. It is quite difficult to shuffle low card numbers when reading for yourself, so an alternative is to shuffle the entire major Arcana and then pick a card at a time, laying them in the correct row. The first card picked per row is placed upright and the remainder placed face down.

Turn over all cards in the first row, moving the Fool between the Magician and High Priestess. Move the Judgement and World card to form two new rows as shown.

These cards show your Hero and the final reward (Resurrection and Returning with the Elixir). Notice some of the cards are reversed, including the final card, shown by the upside down World card.

The first row shows the archetypes at play within you as the Hero, and the last two rows show expected final result. It looks like there the reversed Magician may be causing a lack of confidence, self-deceit, or simply being internally unwilling or unready to complete the task ahead and this will result in a final reward that is unexpected or leaves you wanting, as shown by the reversed World.

It may also be that the question being asked is the wrong one so there is the option to restart after some reflection on the real problem. However, it is more likely that the Tarot is asking you to pay particular attention to the part of yourself most likely to lead to failure.

Next turn one card over in row 2. This represents an important part of your Ordinary World. It could be the archetype that is holding you in place and preventing you moving forward or it could be what will be tested as you attempt to leave the Ordinary world (via the ‘threshold guardian’). It could be neither and instead be your mentor archetype. Exactly which it is often evident by the orientation. An upright card is working for you and a reversal denotes a block.

In the image the Hierophant was selected, suggesting that success will come by following the well-worn path and what you already know to be accepted rather than the new or novel.

The third row represents trials you will face. What will you need to overcome to become ready for the final task ahead? Pick two cards from this row.

The fourth row represents the rebirth. What has to change inside you before you can move forward? Pick one card from this row.

The spread here shows Strength and reversed Justice for the Trials and Death for the Ordeal. The Trials cards look like they would make sense (once we know the initial question asked to the Tarot) but a note about the Death card. This points to having to lose or give up something to move forward and this will be very painful in the short term. This is significantly different from (say) the Hanged man (which means changing perspective for example by turning how you think about a failure into a personal growth opportunity that moves you forward) rather than losing something entirely.

Next we get to the reward/seizing the sword. Pick one from this row.

In the image above, the Star was picked suggesting a new and fruitful period of life that is free of previous constraints. Looking at the next two rows, we see an upright Judgement suggesting a successful finale to the journey (the villain is vanquished, the love interest reaching a happy ending, or the past injustice finally put to rest). Yet the reversed World points to a somewhat hollow or incomplete victory.

No story ever really ends and another reading may be necessary in the future when this end point is reached.

Recall that the Hero’s Journey is circular. At the end of each cycle, you as the Hero ends up at the start of another cycle.

This is foreshadowed at the start of the Major Arcana by the card symbols of the archetypes that form our Hero (Fool, Magician and High Priestess) all having a circle within their symbol. The Fool symbol is the circular zero, and the Magician/High Priestess symbols are built around the same central circle shape. The Magician card shows the relationship again via the Ouroboros symbol (a circular snake eating its own tail). The High Priestess's symbol also shows infinity through the never-ending cycle of the waxing/waning/full moon.

Notes

Adding External Forces to the Reading

Remember when using the Hero’s Journey spread that it only looks at archetypes within your subconscious that drive your journey. The spread does not address external people (although it does signify the long term effects of close family members and other formative people in your life through your inner personal archetypes).

If you want to add an indication of other people, create a shuffled pile of cards that contains only the royals, and pick 3. These represent the personalities of 3 people or groups that will affect your Hero’s journey by being your mentor (upright) or gatekeeper (reversed) forces at the 3 major turning points shown.

How Often to Create a Hero’s Journey Reading

As the Hero’s Journey concentrates on the Major Arcana cards, it predicts a long future arc (typically 6 months or over). Your readings should follow the same timescale per question.