Ruling Cards: An I Ching “Hand-off”*
*In US football, a “hand-off after the snap” means that the quarterback hands the ball immediately to one of the running backs behind the line of scrimmage, hopefully advancing it downfield on the play through the element of surprise. (I won’t get into the even-trickier “double-reverse” here.) Humor me while I stretch the analogy a bit.
AUTHOR’S NOTE: As described in Benebell Wen’s book, I Ching, the Oracle: A Practical Guide to the Book of Changes, one of the two major approaches to the interpretation of a hexagram proposes that the fifth line (of six) from the bottom of the figure is the “ruler” of the mundane aspects of the situation, and thus provides the answer to the inquiry (as I understand it, the uppermost line — “Heaven” — is reserved for the more spiritual and mystical side of the matter, or at least its broader, longer term-implications). The concepts of nominally “feudal” social class or status and “life-topic” also apply to the five lower lines, although those principles don’t translate seamlessly into tarot terms. This inspired me to take a hard look at similar provisions in the conduct of a tarot reading.
The most obvious commonality is the use of a formal “outcome” card, typically but not always the last card in the sequence; a familiar specimen is the tenth or “end of the matter” card in the Celtic Cross. This is a standard feature of most “positional” layouts, but sometimes a different card serves as the main focus of the spread. For example, in a three-or-five-card line (or any other odd-numbered series, for that matter) it could be the middle card of the array, with the cards on both sides acting as modifiers. In such cases there is no linear, left-to-right progression but rather one that converges on the center from both ends. (In Lenormand reading this is called the “descriptive” mode of delineation as opposed to the card-by-card “narrative” model.) Another method assumes that the card of highest rank — trump, court or numbered pip — or greatest influence on the topic of the reading holds the place of honor, and all of the other cards contribute to and ideally reinforce its testimony .
There are even more imaginative ways to do this. I’ve created a number of spreads in which the “outcome” is shown by one of the cards in a “multiple-choice” scenario. The selection is usually made via some form of binary determinant such as an “even-or-odd” dice-roll, a “heads-or-tails” coin-flip or various kinds of “dignity” (similarity by suit, element, number or rank). In other instances, the “conclusion” card changes row or column in response to various “pointers.” Many of these are “mixed-media” spreads that encompass more than one divinatory routine.
Unlike the I Ching practice mentioned above (as well as the Lenormand Grand Tableau “house” system), most of the cartomantic spreads I’m aware of don’t contain dedicated positions that represent “departments of life” such as romance, money and career (the twelve-card “astrological” spread is one that does). Generally, the reader extemporizes by shaping the story-line according to the question asked and the nature of the cards pulled. But I have crafted a few topical spreads with a range of positional variations on a theme, although they don’t lend themselves to any one position “ruling” the rest, they just expose card-related strengths and weaknesses.
I’m thinking that in the future I may be more diligent in this regard when creating new spreads since I prefer a more literal or analytical type of divination that could benefit from the additional structure. I already have numerous topic-specific spreads that fully envelope their subject matter, but they could be particularized further by including discrete positions for different facets of the situation. Then, depending on the cards that land on these positions, one could emerge as “ruling” the entire forecast and I would give it increased importance in the narrative.
I suppose the vocal crowd of intuitive, freestyle readers will squawk as I move more deeply into iterative spread designs, but — Korzybski’s assumptions about “maps-and-territories” aside — I love the depth and detail of the Lenormand Grand Tableau and strongly endorse anything that advances the goal of more precisely delimiting the tarot world-map. Within the established bounds (and despite the increased formality), this will almost certainly offer a more fluid way to decentralize the architecture of a positional spread, and I believe I’m going to get a lot of mileage out of it. Stay tuned for more as I work my way into it.
Originally published at http://parsifalswheeldivination.wordpress.com on May 1, 2024.
