{"id":29403,"date":"2010-10-03T09:02:06","date_gmt":"2010-10-03T14:02:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/?p=29403"},"modified":"2010-10-03T12:49:19","modified_gmt":"2010-10-03T17:49:19","slug":"the-weekend-tarot-reading-queen-of-pentacles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/daily-astrology\/the-weekend-tarot-reading-queen-of-pentacles\/","title":{"rendered":"The Weekend Tarot Reading: Queen of Pentacles"},"content":{"rendered":"

Editor’s Note: If you want to experiment with tarot cards and don’t have any, we provide a free tarot spread generator<\/a> using the Celtic Wings spread, which is based on the traditional Celtic Cross spread. This article<\/a> tells you how to use the spread<\/em>. You can visit Sarah’s website here<\/a>. –efc<\/em><\/p>\n

By Sarah Taylor<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

I think I would do well to take a page from the Queen of Pentacles’ book. Here she is, in many ways a paragon of balance between the spiritual and the physical \u2013 one who understands that the care of the body and the care of the soul are synonymous. Here am I, sitting at my desk with an hour-and-a-half to go before I embark on day two of a grueling training process; having had fewer hours’ sleep than I intended; with no idea what I’m going to pack for lunch let alone eat for breakfast; and a late-night trip to fetch my husband from the station.<\/p>\n

\"Queen<\/a>
The Queen of Pentacles from the Rider-Waite Smith tarot deck, drawn by Pamela Coleman Smith.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Not much balance there. Then again, from an alchemical point of view, I clearly have quite a bit of prima materia<\/em> to work with. (From Wikipedia: “The alchemical operation consists essentially in separating the prima materia, the so-called chaos, into the active principle, the soul, and the passive principle, Mind-body dichotomy the body.”) So there’s always an upside, right?<\/p>\n

And yet, here we all are: another week, another Queen. In spite of everything, it is wonderful to work with a progression.<\/p>\n

In contrast to last weekend’s Queen<\/a>, who, like her sword, was set in hard profile, this Queen’s face has a softer aspect, and her gaze is directed downwards towards the pentacle that she is safeguarding. She is more introspective, more grounded.<\/p>\n

As we’ve discussed in previous articles, the progression from Ace to King in any suit symbolises our own progression through a particular area of our lives at a particular time. Whereas to me the Queen of Swords speaks of the ’emancipated ruler’, someone who has mastery over their thoughts, the Queen of Pentacles lives out the idea that the body is a temple, and that richness here on earth is not necessarily material. While many of the preceding cards in the suit have hinted at material richness, with the protagonists in a town surrounded by commerce; either dressed poorly or ornately \u2013 the Queen is simply dressed, and the prosperity in the card springs from the fertile landscape around her. She is firmly situated in the landscape of the Ace of Pentacles \u2013 a human working with the energy of the Ace to achieve, in one of our reader’s words, “The culmination of all things into their ultimate form in the physical plane.” (Thank you, Charles.)<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Unlike the woman in the Nine of Pentacles, the Queen is dressed in very simple robes, and the throne that she sits on is forged from stone. The only thing that she wears that speaks of monetary wealth is her gold crown, but even here there is a message. The crown’s colour is reflected in the yellow sky behind her \u2013 a colour typically associated with the ground when it is as bold as this \u2013 whereas the mountains in the background are blue. The colours have been inverted, so what is above is below, and below is above. Finally, both crown and sky are reflections of the Pentacle itself, while the landscape surrounding the Queen is tangible, verdant. This is the point where matter and spirit converge.<\/p>\n

In his reference to the Queen of Disks (the corresponding card in the Thoth Tarot), Gerd Ziegler refers to the card as “overcoming the barren past”. And when I look at the Queen, it reminds me in many ways of another card: The Empress, who is often depicted as pregnant. However, here, the Pentacle stands in for The Empress’s fecund belly. The Queen is rather midwife or guardian than mother, the element of us that is responsible for, and adept at, bringing spirit down into matter.<\/p>\n

What’s more, the Queen seems to be aware of our presence in the way that she is holding the Pentacle away from her body, towards us. She is mindful of her audience. Perhaps for us this makes the idea of the wisdom that she imparts more personal and more immediate. As with the Ace, where the presentation of the Pentacle on the disembodied hand seemed to say to us, “Here it is, a gift from the divine. Use it well”, so the Queen reminds us of this birthright. We can spend so much time working towards some goal, that we forget that it is in the service of something that isn’t purely material.<\/p>\n

We hit our midlife crises. We become confused. We often try to address the chaos through acquiring new things, new ideas, a new body, a new lover. What we forget about is acquiring new meaning<\/em>. I think this, in many ways, is what this card is about. The Queen’s existence is meaningful because she understands why she is here, and what she is doing. She works deliberately and in balance with nature, and her environment is abundant and supportive, if not opulent or glitzy.<\/p>\n

So when I am stuck in my head, panicking and rushing, the Queen of Pentacles is a reminder that there is something bigger going on than my mad ramblings around a messy house. If we were to make time to ground ourselves and to look after ourselves, we also make space for a better working partnership with what brings meaning to our lives. Great advice for the start of the week.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Editor’s Note: If you want to experiment with tarot cards and don’t have any, we provide a free tarot spread generator using the Celtic Wings spread, which is based on the traditional Celtic Cross spread. This article tells you how to use the spread. You can visit Sarah’s website here. –efc By Sarah Taylor I … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":470,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"generate_page_header":""},"categories":[1,183],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29403"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/470"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29403"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29403\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29403"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29403"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29403"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}