Tarot and the sky: star signs, planets and the moon
Tarot and astrology grew up separately, and for most of tarot's history nobody connected them. The link was made in the nineteenth century, and it is a map of meanings rather than a force: nobody has shown that the planets change which card turns up. What the map gives a reader is a shared vocabulary, so that a sign, a planet and a card can be talked about in the same breath.
How the two were joined
The joining was done mainly by the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, founded in London in 1888. Its members matched the twenty-two trumps with the twenty-two letters of the Hebrew alphabet, and then with the building blocks of astrology. The numbers fitted neatly: three elements, seven classical planets and twelve signs add up to exactly twenty-two.
The tarot deck on this site was designed by a member of the order, and many of its pictures carry the astrology inside them. The Emperor's stone throne is carved with rams' heads, the symbol of Aries, the sign the Golden Dawn gave to his card.
Rams' heads on the Emperor's throne: the card of Aries.
The tarot card for each star sign
In the Golden Dawn system, each of the twelve signs has one major card. Many readers treat it as a personal card, one to pay attention to when it comes up.
- Aries: The Emperor
- Taurus: The Hierophant
- Gemini: The Lovers
- Cancer: The Chariot
- Leo: Strength
- Virgo: The Hermit
- Libra: Justice
- Scorpio: Death
- Sagittarius: Temperance
- Capricorn: The Devil
- Aquarius: The Star
- Pisces: The Moon
The cards of Leo, Aquarius and Pisces.
The planets and the elements
The seven planets known to the ancient world each have a card too. Mercury, planet of messages and quick thinking, goes with the Magician. The Moon goes with the High Priestess, who has a crescent moon at her feet. Venus belongs to the Empress, Jupiter to the Wheel of Fortune, Mars to the Tower, the Sun to the Sun, and Saturn, the slowest planet and the planet of time and limits, to the World.
The last three trumps were given to the elements: air to the Fool, water to the Hanged Man and fire to Judgement.
The four suits follow the elements as well. Wands are fire, Cups are water, Swords are air and Pentacles are earth, which ties each suit to three signs: the fire signs Aries, Leo and Sagittarius to Wands, the water signs Cancer, Scorpio and Pisces to Cups, the air signs Gemini, Libra and Aquarius to Swords, and the earth signs Taurus, Virgo and Capricorn to Pentacles. The system goes further still and gives each number card from two to ten a planet in a sign: the Two of Wands, for example, is Mars in Aries.
Mercury, the Moon and Mars: the Magician, the High Priestess and the Tower.
The moon's phase
Of everything in the sky, the moon is the easiest to follow without a chart: look up, and you can see where it is in its month. Each phase has a long-standing character. The new moon is for beginnings, made on trust rather than evidence. The first quarter is where the first real obstacle tends to show up. The full moon puts everything in view, including what you had been avoiding. The last quarter is for letting go rather than starting.
The readings on this site use that cycle. Each card has a written reading for each of eight phases, upright and reversed, so the same card reads differently at the new moon than at the full. The sky is worked out from the date, and the note at the foot of every reading says which phase it is and what it asks of you.
The Moon card, and the crescent at the High Priestess's feet.
Mercury retrograde
Several times a year Mercury seems, seen from Earth, to move backwards across the sky for about three weeks. Astrologers traditionally read it as a time when messages go astray and plans need a second look. Because it covers roughly a fifth of the year, this site does not treat it as a disaster: when Mercury is retrograde, the reading suggests re-checking and returning to things rather than launching new ones.
What the sky does and does not do here
On this site, your three cards are drawn by a shuffle that is fixed for you and the date, so asking twice on the same day gives the same spread. Your star sign does not pick the cards. It decides how they are read: the note on your sign, and the voice the reading takes. The moon's phase decides which of a card's readings you are given.
None of it is a prediction. The planets are a vocabulary that people have used for a very long time to think about their lives, and a reading uses that vocabulary to give you something to reflect on for the day.
See which three cards come up for you today, read for your star sign and the moon.
Get today’s readingRider–Waite–Smith, 1909 · art by Pamela Colman Smith