14 - Temperance Tarot Card
The Temperance card is tarot card number 14, although it is the 15th card of the Major Arcana because the 1st of the 22 Major Arcana cards is number 0 (The Fool).
The Temperance tarot
card is associated with the need for balance and moderation.
This tarot card encourages the release of the requirements of our egos
for pride, arrogance, and all dysfunctional attachments in
order to facilitate our inner strengths and growth.
The Temperance tarot
card recognizes the importance of both the material and the
spiritual components of our lives. This is the true meaning
of the sense of 'balance' conveyed by this card. Its advice
to accept all things in moderation
- including moderation itself - in order to leave enough
space in our appreciation for spiritual and physical / material
blessings.
In the cases of traditional tarot packs such as the Rider Waite, Robin Wood and Golden Dawn decks, the Temperance tarot
card depicts a large angelic winged figure standing with
one foot in a pool of water. The background to this scene
is a natural setting, the details of which vary with the
specific tarot deck and the style of the deck.
Some words and phrases associated with the Temperance tarot
card include:
- Moderation
- Control
- Discipline
- Patience
- Balance
- Calm,
- Equilibrium
- Peace
Note: The image of this tarot card shown on the right (above-right) is from an early 1900s French tarot deck that has been made available for general use via the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license. This shows a distinctly different style of illustration from that of modern tarot decks but is of historical and artistic interest.
More about the Major Arcana
The cards of the Major Arcana are widely considered to be the
most powerful cards in the Tarot Deck. The 22 cards of the Major
Arcana tell a complete story when arranged in upright and numerical
order (beginning with 0 - The
Fool then progressing through the sequence of Major Arcana cards until 21 - The World).
This is a story of personal development and enlightenment
that is sometimes referred to as "The Fool's Journey".
Some texts also include meanings for "reversed
cards". These are for the situation in which the cards are shuffled in both
order and orientation. The theoretical advantage to this is that
it effectively doubles the number of possible "cards" in
the deck from 78 to 156. However, in terms of the calculation
of obtaining results according to chance alone, it is not a simple
mathematical doubling because once a card has been drawn it cannot be drawn again in the opposite orientation in the same reading.
