This is card number 1 the magician; the first archetype the fool meets on his walk through the tarot’s major arcana.
Over the centuries, the magician has had many names; trickster, wizard, juggler, alchemist, shaman, magus.
Magus from the Greek magoi/mágos for wise man, someone educated, connected to the world of priests. The three kings or wise men who visited baby jesus were magicians or magi.
In early tarot, the magician is the archetypal trickster. On the street, in the market or with a troup of travelling players, he performs and entertains, making money through the creation of illusion. Cup and ball routines or guess the dice, he’s skilled with sleight of hand, often a juggler, nearly always a charlatan. Think fast-talking salesman, quick tongue and sleaze – but this is the tarot and, like the magician card, what is seen can deceive…
Magicians possess special skills. The tarot magician deals with a secret knowledge which sets him apart apart from the crowd. The card represents the energy of individual action, how to manifest desire, turn a thought or dream into reality. This is the world of consciousness. A material world, where change can happen through willpower.
The magician’s task is to show the fool he has the same creative energy and ability to make change happen. Maybe we can’t change the world but it’s nearly always possible to bring about change in ourselves.
Italian tarot decks named the magician Bagatto from bagatelle, meaning little thing. As tarot spread across Europe, the magician became the Bateleur from baastel or bastelleur for juggler or puppeteer. Still the trickster and skilled with deception, older tarots, such as the Marseilles style decks, show a variety of tools and tricks on his table.
As a performer, the magician possesses a confident control of his powers. His world is the boundary between what’s seen and unseen. What’s known and what remains a mystery.
He deals with transformation and represents individual willpower, which resulst in physical change or manifestation.
In the Waite/Coleman Smith tarot, one arm of the magician is raised, holding a wand or tool of power. Very Harry Potterish!
The wand appears in the Visconti Sforza decks from Renaissance Italy, and in the Marseilles style tarots from the 1600’s.
The top and bottom of the wand nearly always ends in a point – although the wand in the Jean Noblet tarot looks suspiciously rude!
The other arm of the Waite/Coleman Smith magician points downwards. Standing between heaven and earth, he is a conduit between the physical and non-physical worlds.
Above the magician’s head is the infinity symbol, or lemniscate. The symbol is hinted at in the floppy rim of the Visconti Sforza magician and in the edge of the hat in the Marseilles tarots.
A lemniscate represents the concept of eternity or endlessness. It’s been connected to ouroboros; a snake eating its own tail, often used in myth to represent the infinite. It also looks like a mobius strip which shows us continuity with no ending.
The card is full of red roses and white lilies, colours mirrored in the magician’s clothes. The red rose symbolises the physical, while lilies stand for the spiritual. Together, they represent body and mind. The fool needs to understand and come to terms with his own duality.
He represents ‘as above so below’ . The saying continues “as without so within, as the universe, so the soul”. The tarot magician shows the interconnectedness of life where every action has a reaction.
The principle has come down to us in many ways;
- you get back what you give
- every cause has an effect
- nothing happens in isolation
- you are what you do
The magician is telling the fool everything he does will have a consequence. He’s not only the source of creative energy, also has control over it. The fool also has the power to make change happen. He has more control over his life than he realises.
The force of creative energy runs through the magician, a bit like Star Wars. The magician could well be saying let the force be with you where force is the energy we feel when we make change happen.
Have you ever felt so full of energy you have to take action to discharge it, like to dance or run.
This restlessless shows the power the magician channels. Tricks are based on sleight of hand but the tarot magician can make things happen for real.
While older tarots show tricks on the magician’s table, the Waite/Coleman Smith deck shows the tools of the tarot’s four suits, which represent the elements. They are also the suits of the minor arcana.
- cups stand for water and emotions
- pentacles are for earth and material possessions
- swords are air and intellectual power
- wands represent fire and creativity
The magician himself symbolises the fifth element of ether in which everything else exists.
The writings of Aristotle were influential in renaissance Italy where the cards first emerged. He suggested the area between the Moon and earth was filled with the four elements of earth, air, fire and water, while the Moon, planets and stars were made of a fifth, more ethereal, element, called aether or quintessence.
The magician is the master of these elements. He understands how each of the tools give him power and the knowledge to manipulate action. To cause change.
The fool has all this potential but at his stage of the journey it has not yet been fully realised, unlike the magician who represents integration.
You might not trust a street or a stage magician but when it comes to the tarot, you feel a truth. The magician sees you. He sees the fool. He knows everyone comes from the same source and his role is to show the fool there’s more to himself than he currently realises.
Whether it’s to follow the 18th century occultists, who believed in non-material states of existence, or to take a psychological standpoint to explore and understand the hidden subconscious parts of the self, the tarot can help.
The lessons of this card are about learning to create in order to make change happen. We rarely achieve without trying so we need to create the conditions where the change we want can be manifested.
If we only talk or imagine or dream about possible outcomes, they’re not going to happen.
Waiting for change is not enough.
We make our own opportunities and the magician warns the fool not to be passive. He’s responsible for his own future and the tools of the tarot will help him know what he wants and how to set about achieving it.
There’s a lot to take in with the magician card.
The fool has to take the first step. Open the door. Make an effort. There might be lack of immediate reward but the more he practices, the sooner he’ll see results.
Lessons from the magician include the following guidance.
- nothing comes from nothing
- you can’t change the world but you can change your attitudes towards it
- don’t convince yourself something is right when you know it’s wrong
- learn to control your reactions
These are the keys to meaningful relationships.
Without this knowledge of self, there’s always the risk of trying to find yourself in other people. But they might not always be in your life and when they leave, they’ll take your sense of self with them.
The magician is saying in order to achieve the fool needs to do the ground work. To know thyself, the command etched above the entrance to the ancient oracle at Delphi and the first lesson of the tarot.
All this feels like information overload to the fool.
There’s too much to take in. What he really wants is to find a bar, some food and have conversations with friends. He wants a good time and hasn’t taken in half what the magician is saying, so thinks about moving on.
But it’s worth taking time to pause and consider the magician’s message.
When it comes to making the most of life, it’s down to you. Nothing comes from nothing. You have sole responsibility for yourself and the magician will always be there, waiting, until this lesson has been absorbed.
The magician is about consciousness while the next card in a walk through the tarot is the high priestess who represents the parallel unconscious, the world of dreams, intuition and emotions.
Join us as we take the next step on the journey…
images my own, copyright free from wikipedia commons or from https://pixabay.com/
