The “Moving Card” Idea-Development Spread

AUTHOR’S NOTE: I’ve just come up with a notion that intrigues me quite a bit, and I credit metaphysical author and blogger Benebell Wen for taking me there via the discussion of “moving lines” in her book, I Ching, The Oracle: A Practical Guide to the Book of Changes. Its ideal application may be in a pioneering business environment where innovative ideas must be carefully shepherded from inception to actualization if they are to be successfully implemented.

In traditional Chinese hexagram interpretation, any line exhibiting a polarity (yang/positive or yin/negative) that is different from that of its position in the “baseline” model (in which Lines 1, 3 and 5 are yang and Lines 2, 4 and 6 are yin) becomes a moving line in that it turns into its opposite, thus creating an entirely new hexagram that delivers a supplemental reading.

In the world of tarot, I’ve done something similar for a card I’ve pulled by locating the one diametrically opposite it on the “Chaldean” wheel of correspondences formulated by the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, and treating it as additional information. But I had no systematic plan for using it, and here I propose to address that shortcoming. The concept behind it is correlation by Elemental Dignity.

I began by creating a four-card line spread with positions embodying the four classical elements of Empedocles (and, so I understand, Zoroaster before him). Going left-to-right, I arranged these according to the usual progression of Fire, Water, Air and Earth (departing from the Golden Dawn’s qabalistic right-to-left array). Their titles reflect stages in the evolution of a creative idea: Inspiration (Fire); Integration (Water); Clarification (Air); and Realization (Earth); these correspond to the acts of conception; correlation with existing practices; identification and correction of any conceptual flaws; and closure of the “R&D” cycle preliminary to implementation.

Next, I’ll shuffle a tarot deck and deal four cards, left-to-right and face-up, into these four positions. (I will allow for reversals; more on that below.) Then I will examine the alignment between the elemental nature of the positions and that of the cards that land there. If they are either friendly (Fire-and-Fire; Fire and Air; Water-and-Water; Water-and-Earth; Air-and-Air; or Earth-and-Earth) or cooperative (Fire-and-Earth or Water-and-Air), no adjustments are necessary and those aspects of the developmental arc will be expected to play out according to the upright or reversed meaning of the cards (which may or may not be conducive to a satisfactory outcome).

However, if the elemental match is hostile (Fire-and-Water or Air-and-Earth), I will turn to the Chaldean wheel (see below), find the card directly across the circle and read that in lieu of the original card for that phase of the cycle (This is the “moving card” of the title, and it gives the spread a different complexion as well as potentially offering any impasse a “way out”). Note that if the card initially pulled was reversed, the “mirroring” card should also be treated as reversed since the dynamics of the energy pattern should not be affected by elemental reassignment. Challenges in coping with the indirect inputs and oblique variants associated with reversal will remain even if the elemental signature is altered; they may just be filtered through a different archetypal lens.

The only twist in this approach is that not all of the Major Arcana correspond to an astrological sign; seven of them relate to planets and three to Primal Elements, and as such they don’t appear on the Chaldean wheel. In these instances the most that can be done is to select the card that represents the planet or element of an opposing nature. These would be Sun (Sun trump) opposite Moon (High Priestess); Venus (Empress) opposite Mars (Tower); and Jupiter (Wheel of Fortune) opposite Saturn (World). Mercury (the Magician) is something of a “chameleon” that has no polar opposite (except perhaps Pluto in esoteric astrology, which doesn’t figure into the Golden Dawn’s hypothesis).

However, Mercury’s two signs of rulership, Gemini and Virgo, sit opposite two in the zodiac that are ruled by Jupiter in classical astrology, Sagittarius (Temperance) and Pisces (Moon trump), and an argument can be made for either of those cards as being opposite to the Magician. Another option is the High Priestess (astrological Moon) since Mercury and the Moon are both fast-moving lightweights in astrology, and the High Priestess already forms a contrasting duo with the Magician; in another sense, astronomical Mercury never strays any further than 28 degrees from the Sun, so the two could be taken together as polar opposites to the Moon. The reader can decide which one best fits the context of the question or topic (personally — in keeping with the yin-and-yang premise — I like the male Magician opposed to the female High Priestess as “outer” and “inner” manifestations).

Among the elements, Primal Fire (Judgement) opposes Primal Water (Hanged Man) and Primal Air opposes Primal Earth (not really a discrete element but an amalgam of the rest) that has been assigned to the World as a secondary correspondence. Some of this isn’t metaphysically perfect but it should work well enough in practice.

Here is an imaginary example reading (none of the cards turned up reversed):

In the “Inspiration” position, Fire and Air are on friendly terms, so the initial stage of development looks like a “slam-dunk.” However, the 5 of Swords (“Defeat”) implies that the idea doesn’t have a very strong pedigree to recommend it; perhaps it came from a “higher-up” who doesn’t have a clue about engineering but knows what he wants. It will probably be pushed along just to please the boss even though it could be “DOA” when it reaches later phases of the process.

In the “Integration” position, Water and Water are eminently agreeable, so no alarms will be raised at this point since the developers are keeping a low profile and just “going with the flow.” The Ace of Cups could mean that a junior engineer (still “wet behind the ears”) will get the nod to carry the ball since if he fails it will be no great loss if he is fired. The Ace could also show that the idea is entirely without precedent in the annals of the company and thus has a certain emotional cachet.

In the “Clarification” position, the Ace of Disks as hostile “Earth-in-Air” indicates that the conceptual basis for the idea stubbornly resists “tweaking” to improve its viability. Something has become “locked into” the design that can’t be easily extracted at this late date, and the incipient Ace may reflect that it was embedded in the original memo from the boss that laid out his vision. At any rate, its lack of technical and commercial credibility is starting to become obvious. The Ace of Disks reminds me of the old business aphorism that ridiculed lack of foresight: the boss may have said “Bring me a rock! Any rock!” while providing no other descriptive details about his request, and this is what he got (which everyone else in the company realizes looks more like a “turd”). This is the first of the two “moving cards,” and it morphs into the Ace of Cups, this second iteration of which presents “Water-in-Air,” an alignment that is at least “neutral and supportive” according to Golden Dawn theory. It seems to me like we’re starting to get into “putting lipstick on a pig” territory as the “spin artists” get to work trying to transform the proverbial “sow’s ear” into a “silk purse.” But those few proponents of the idea who aren’t in Marketing are running on emotional fumes.

In the “Realization” position, the Star (Aquarius) also depicts a hostile alignment, this time “Air-in-Earth.” The Star can be a card of “wishful thinking” in that the hope it signifies may be unrealistic and too remote in probability for it to succeed. The harsh reality of Earth drags it down. The scenario is beginning to look like “the hare-brained scheme that never went anywhere.” This is the second of the “moving cards,” and it transforms into Strength (“Lust” in the Thoth deck, although for this purpose I’m ignoring Crowley’s swap in zodiacal alignment). This shift mitigates the unhappy emphasis of “Air-in-Earth” by substituting the “neutral and supportive” nature of “Fire-in-Earth.” giving the idea at least a lukewarm boost in confidence. Since it corresponds to Leo, the Fixed sign of of the Sun’s rulership, I describe it as “applied solar force.” But all of the enthusiastic “stroking-and-stoking” in the world may not be enough to rescue the situation; should the idea ever see the light of day it could fall short of magnificence, if not in the eyes of its target audience then in those of the company’s “bean-counters.” The advice would be to cut any losses now before things reach the point of management “cheerleading-and-grandstanding,” stop the hemorrhaging of resources and either shelve the whole thing or go back to the drawing board.

Originally published at http://parsifalswheeldivination.wordpress.com on April 29, 2024.