The Moon Card

The Moon is all about illusion, mystery, dreams, intuition, and a little bit of danger. There is a spooky element here, so I thought it would be appropriate to discuss this around Halloween!

 

When The Moon falls in a reading, pay attention to what you might be avoiding. Sometimes it's an obvious thing that you simply don't want to confront, but if you continue in that vein, what was an inconvenient issue could blossom into a very big problem. You're probably ignoring something that you need to deal with.

 

The crayfish represents the deepest subconscious. When the tide is high, we don't see what's beneath the surface of the water, so we don't give it much thought. When the tide goes out, we have a glimpse at what lurks on the ocean floor. It is not to be ignored--it's as much a part of our world and our evolution as things we see clearly every day.

 

The moon is the symbol of madness (lunacy) and femininity, of our most basic animal urges. Think about the concept of the werewolf--it's mirrored here in the dog and the wolf in the foreground (the former is domesticated, the latter is wild). The moon's light is reflected, not direct, hence all the illusion. It brings our secret side to the surface: suppressed feelings, clandestine motives. You must acknowledge these things or they'll find a way to take over.

 

Purge those deep memories. Look beyond the illusion. Pay attention to your dreams and your subconscious instincts. Once you bring what's in the darkness into the light, you can move forward in a less altered state. Use your imagination, but don't confuse fantasy with reality. This is a very psychic card and, at times, shows that you have an uncanny and very deep attraction to another person...or vice-versa. To wade through the message of The Moon, trust your instincts and be completely honest with yourself.

 

For some more clues to the meaning of The Moon card, compare the version from the Rider-Waite deck above to The Moon from the Halloween Tarot to the right. (I admit I'm partial to this particular version with the French bulldog representing domestication in opposition to the werewolf. Cute!) Note all the arrows lending to the confusing, illusory aspects of the card. The crayfish makes an unexpected appearance, and the castle in the distance signifies finding your way through the chaos to a place of stability. Comparing the same card from different decks is a great way to expand your insight. Look closer--you might find more!

The Halloween Tarot

There are so many Tarot decks out there that I can't even keep track anymore, and that's a pretty cool thing. No matter what you're interested in--cats, dragons, Arthurian legend, photo collage, specific artists (Hieronymus Bosch, Salvador Dali, etc.), Celtic traditions, vampires, crystals, and on and on--there's a deck in that theme. I happen to be nuts about Halloween, and when I first saw the Halloween Tarot by Kipling West (U.S. Games Systems, 2003; this link is for the deck and book set) a few years ago in a metaphysical book shop, I thoroughly enjoyed it. It wasn't until I finally purchased it just a few months ago, however, that I really fell in love with its numerous charms. I initially thought that this might be kind of a fluffy deck; the colors are bright, striking, and whimsical, and the images are not "dark." Even traditionally unnerving cards like The Tower, Death, and The Devil have a lighthearted bent in the Halloween Tarot. A curious black cat appears in every single card of both the Major and Minor Arcana, and we follow its journey like we would follow The Fool through his. When I finally did a reading with the Halloween Tarot, any illusions I had about it being fluffy were dispelled. These cards were crisp and clear in their message, and, most importantly, I had a lot of fun reading them. I re-discovered Halloween! Traditional Tarot suits are Wands (fire), Cups (water), Swords (air), and Pentacles (earth). The Halloween Tarot makes excellent use of these elemental correlations and gives us Imps (in place of Wands/fire), Ghosts (Cups/water), Bats (Swords/air), and Pumpkins (Pentacles/earth). Court Cards follow the typical Rider-Waite structure of Pages, Knights, Queens, and Kings. Since a picture is worth a thousand words, I'm including several images from the deck below (some of the Major Arcana; a Court Card from each suit, and a Minor Arcana card from each suit) along with brief comments: I love this Death card. The growth/change/rebirth theme is wonderful here. In Temperance, the artist and alchemist themes are apparent as the witch happily mixes her concoctions. There's a lot going on in these cards. Frankenstein is the steadfast Emperor! The Bride of Frankenstein as The Empress is a fantastic symbol of the creation of new life, and she expresses her nurturing side with her cat. The solitary Hermit is shown as a mad scientist, keeping to himself and spending his time gleaning knowledge. In The Tower card, the traditionally terrifying image is made more whimsical in the spirit of Halloween. Strength makes clear the impact of finesse over brute strength. The image on the right is the fully reversible backside of all the cards. I prefer my card backs to be reversible so that I don't know in advance if the card will fall right side up or reversed. Examples of the suits of Imps and Bats. Happiness and celebration are clear in the Four of Imps, and the woman in the Eight of Bats is wrapped up in toilet paper by mischief-making bats as if in the midst of a Halloween prank. She can easily escape, but chooses not to. Examples of the suits of Pumpkins and Ghosts. The woman in the Nine of Pumpkins is content and successful as she tends her garden. The three Ghosts celebrate, intertwined, over a starlit pumpkin patch. One each of the four Pages and Knights. One each of the four Queens and Kings. If you get a chance to read with this deck, definitely give it a go. As I said, I was surprised at and so pleased with the results (shame on my preconceived notions!). When I was a kid, Halloween was fun and spooky, and a time I looked forward to all year; as a grown-up, I find that I'm reminded of those feelings when I pull out this deck. I consider it a gift.

An Abridged History of Samhain, aka Halloween

Who doesn’t feel the spooky vibe on and around Halloween? There’s plenty of history to give us all good reason for the goosebumps, that’s for sure. While the roots of Halloween (aka Samhain, pronounced SOW-in) and its traditions aren’t crystal clear, there are certainly prevailing notions with historical pedigree. Halloween and Samhain are essentially the same thing, though the term Samhain came before what we know more popularly as Halloween. Before we get to that fine distinction, first things first: let's go back about 2,000 years to the Celtic Pagans who started the whole thing.

 

The Celts lived and breathed the rhythm of the seasons and the land, which is hard for us to even conceptualize in our age of automation and an easily accessed, year-round food supply. The time of the harvest was critical to the Celts, and the harvest at Samhain was the final harvest of the year for them. This day also marks the Celtic or Pagan New Year and the start of winter, and as such, it is a time for endings and beginnings. Whatever harvest remained was left to rot, falling back to the earth where it would feed the soil and ultimately be reborn as a new harvest over the coming months. Because this symbolism was so crucial and all-encompassing for the Celts, whose very lives were tied to the weather and the turning of the year, this became the time when they would honor their dead. They determined that Samhain marked the time when the veil between the worlds of the living and the dead was at its thinnest. Even today, this transitional time of year is prime for ghosts and spirits, both angry and kind, to communicate with and walk among us.

“Samhain” means “end of summer.” The Celts would have harvest festivals on Samhain that, in part, celebrated the kindness that their sun god, Baal, showed them prior to the reaping. The Druids (Celtic priests) were a proactive bunch, so instead of simply waiting for the dead to stop on by, they would dress as scarily as possible—antlers and animal hides and the like--to ward off any evil spirits preemptively. (Sound familiar? Halloween costumes!) The Celts would also use bonfires to banish ghosts, and made offerings of plants and animals, which were added to these bonfires. When the fires burned themselves out, they Druids would interpret the charred remains (like reading tea leaves) to gain insight into the circumstances of the coming year. This perpetuated the strong ties between Samhain and  divination.

 

Just as the bonfires would scare off any looming ghoulies, so, too, would the head-shaped lanterns the Druids used for that very purpose. This was likely the forbearer of the jack-o’-lantern, though in Great Britain it probably originated as some other vegetable, like the turnip, since pumpkins weren’t local and didn’t catch on until Samhain reached America. Samhain certainly wasn’t all about banishing ghosts, however; welcoming and celebrating the spirits of the dead was just as important, if not more so. The Celts would leave out goodies for the well-loved spirits of dearly departed—think cookies for Santa at Christmas. This is likely how trick-or-treating originated: if the living relative didn't leave out any food, the jilted spirit might not take too kindly to that and wreak a little havoc.  

The Romans had similar festivals around the same time in honor of Pomona, their goddess of fruitful abundance (including the very seasonal apple orchards). It wasn’t until Christianity really picked up speed around 400 C.E. that the Celts and Romans felt pressure to put a lid on their festivals honoring the harvest and the dead. Christians were threatened by the stronghold of Pagan beliefs, particularly with regard to Samhain, so they moved All Hallows’ Day (now commonly called All Saints’ Day, a day of reflection and prayer for saints that both did and did not already have their own calendar event) from May to November 1st. November 2nd became All Souls' Day, a Christian day to honor the dead in their own traditions. October 31st, then, became All Hallows’ Eve, which morphed over time into Hallowe’en. Ditch the apostrophe, and here we land in 2011.

Halloween came to the States shortly after we were liberated from England in the late 18th century. Obviously it struck a chord: we’re still dressing up, lighting bonfires, carving jack-o’-lanterns, trick-or-treating, practicing various forms of divination, and scaring ourselves with ghost stories and other tales of the dead.