Tarot Cards Meanings - Major Arcana - The Tower - meaning in detail
The Tower (La Maison Dieu) - tarot card meaning in detail
The Lord of the Hosts of the Mighty
Card Number: 16
Key Number: 27
Rulership: Mars
Hebrew Letter: Peh
Translation: Mouth
Numerical Value: 9
Astrological Associations: Mars
Card Number: 16
Key Number: 27
Rulership: Mars
Hebrew Letter: Peh
Translation: Mouth
Numerical Value: 9
Astrological Associations: Mars
Full Meaning
The Tower card, as with the Death Card and Devil card, tend to cause the greatest amount of concern. However unlike the latter two, The Tower card really is one that offers a warning. The Tower card shows a tower that is built on false beliefs and lies. A thunderbolt of lightning strikes from above to shatter those believes and preconceptions.
Although you may not realize it now, things are going to change. This card warns of a very rude awakening, because everything may not be what it seems. The Tower suggests the collapsing of the norm in favour of something much deeper and better. This card is indicative that change is coming. However no matter how disturbing any revelations that may come to light, or alterations to your life, please be assured that you will see that in the end it is all for the best. When this card shows up in your spread the most effective way to tackle it, is to accept that old outdated forms will come tumbling down but this will inevitably give rise to bigger and better things in your life. Freedom and enlightenment are starred.
Traditional Symbolism
Occult explanations attached to this card are meagre and mostly disconcerting. It is idle to indicate that it depicts min in all its aspects, because it bears this evidence on the surface. It is said further that it contains the first allusion to a material building, but I do not conceive that the Tower is more or less material than the pillars which we have met with in three previous cases. I see nothing to warrant Papus in supposing that it is literally the fall of Adam, but there is more in favour of his alternative--that it signifies the materialization of the spiritual word. The bibliographer Christian imagines that it is the downfall of the mind, seeking to penetrate the mystery of God. I agree rather with Grand Orient that it is the ruin of the House of We, when evil has prevailed therein, and above all that it is the rending of a House of Doctrine.
I understand that the reference is, however, to a House of Falsehood. It illustrates also in the most comprehensive way the old truth that "except the Lord build the house, they labour in vain that build it." There is a sense in which the catastrophe is a reflection from the previous card, but not on the side of the symbolism which I have tried to indicate therein. It is more correctly a question of analogy; one is concerned with the fall into the material and animal state, while the other signifies destruction on the intellectual side.
The Tower has been spoken of as the chastisement of pride and the intellect overwhelmed in the attempt to penetrate the Mystery of God; but in neither case do these explanations account for the two persons who are the living sufferers. The one is the literal word made void and the other its false interpretation. In yet a deeper sense, it may signify also the end of a dispensation, but there is no possibility here for the consideration of this involved question.
The Major Arcana suit.
