The Magician

The Magician

The Magician

The Magician, The Magus, or The Juggler (I)
is the first trump or Major Arcana card in traditional Tarot decks.

Action — Consciousness — Concentration — Personal power
Practicality — Energy — Creativity — Movement
Precision — Conviction — Manipulation — Self confidence
Being objective — Focusing — Determination — Initiative

A youthful figure in the robe of a magician has the face of the divine Apollo, the sun god, with a confident smile and shining eyes.
Above his head is the mysterious sign of the Holy Spirit, the sign of life, like an endless cord, forming the lemniscate of infinity.
About his waist is a serpent-cincture or girdle, the ouroboros, the serpent devouring its own tail. The ouroboros is an ancient symbol of eternity, eternal becoming, or transmutation and transformation, but in this case it indicates more especially the eternity of attainment in the spirit.
In the Magician's right hand is a wand raised towards heaven, the sky or the element æther, while his left hand is pointing to the earth. This iconographic gesture has multiple meanings, but is endemic to the Mysteries, symbolizing divine immanence, the ability of the magician to bridge the gap between heaven and earth.
On the table in front of the Magician the symbols of the four Tarot suits signify the Classical elements of earth, air, fire and water.
Beneath are roses and lilies, the flos campi and lilium convallium, changed into garden flowers, to show the culture of aspiration.


When the Magician appears in a spread, it points to the talents, capabilities and resources at the querent's disposal.
Depending on the card's placement in relation to other cards, the message is to tap into one's full potential rather than holding back, especially when there is a need to transform something.
There are choices and directions to take.
Guidance can arrive through one's own intuition or in the form of someone who brings about change or transformation.

The card can mean that a manipulator is floating around, usually if it's reversed. He may be a beneficent guide, but he does not necessarily have our best interests in mind.
He may also represent the querent’s ego or self awareness.
He can also represent the intoxication of power, both good and bad.

This card signifies the divine motive in man.
It is also the unity of the individual being on all planes, and in a very high sense it is thought.
With further reference to the "sign of life", i.e. the infinity symbol and its connection with the number 8, it may be remembered that Christian Gnosticism speaks of rebirth in Christ as a change "unto the Ogdoad."
The mystic number is termed Jerusalem above, the Land flowing with Milk and Honey, the Holy Spirit and the Land of the Lord.
According to Martinism, 8 is the number of Christ.

In other traditions this card can refer to scholarly knowledge.
The Fool (card 0) has learned something about the workings of the world and now sees himself as powerful.
Perhaps the reputation of the Magician is derived from the Fool misunderstanding what is happening while the High Priestess (the next card) is looking back, thinking that the Magician is missing the point of spiritual knowledge.

Some schools associate him with Hermes, especially Hermes Trismegistus, a syncretic Egyptian/Greek figure who is a combination of Hermes and of Thoth, a god of the moon, knowledge, and writing.
In this aspect, The Magician guides The Fool through the first step out of the cave of childhood into the sunlight of consciousness, just as Hermes guides Persephone out of the Underworld every year.

He represents the potential of a new adventure, chosen or thrust upon one.
A journey undertaken in daylight, in the Enlightenment tradition.
He brings things out of the darkness into the light.
He explores the world in order to master it.
He is solar consciousness.

He is associated through the cross sums (the sum of the digits) with Key 10, The Wheel of Fortune, picking up on Hermes as a Trickster figure and a god of chance, and Key 19, The Sun, bringing us back to Apollo and to enlightenment.

He embodies the lesson of “as above, so below," the lesson that mastery in one realm may bring mastery in another.
He also warns of the danger of applying lessons from one realm to another.

The Magician transcends duality.
He has learned the fundamental elements of the universe, represented by emblems of the four suits of the tarot already broken apart and lying on the table before him. Similarly, in the Book of Thoth deck, he is crowned by snakes, another symbol of both infinity and dualism, as snakes have learned from Gilgamesh how to shed their skins and be reborn, thus achieving a type of immortality; the blind prophet Tiresias split apart coupling snakes and as a result became a woman, transcending the dualism of gender.

I don't know if you've ever felt like that

That you wanted to sleep for a thousand years.

Or just not exist.
Or just not be aware that you do exist.

Or something like that.

I think wanting that is very morbid,
but I want it when I get like this.

Everyone you ever love will reject you or die.

Everything you ever create will be thrown away.
Everything you’re proud of will end up as trash.

on a long enough time line,
the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.

The best deeds go silently unrewarded

If u want to make a omelette,
you have to break a few eggs.

Without pain, without sacrifice, we would have nothing.