Square of 9 with the Tarot

Reading cards is like playing detective. There’s a problem, a concern, and we dig into our cards and spread to try to find useful information to detect what the problem is and what could be done to solve it.

For questions like “why” and “how”,  a card configuration I like a lot is the square of 9. A useful disposition of cards, be it with Tarot, Lenormand, or playing cards. Sometimes I read the corners first, then the cross around the center, before reading line per line and column per column. 

Of course, like everything else in cartomancy, there is no fixed rule. If something in particular catches my eye, I will start there. And sometimes, I just forget the rules and go with what I feel is important. I tend also to relax the rules when reading it with the Tarot de Marseille instead of Lenormand. 

As I already showed an example of this spread with Lenormand, I show this time a reading that was done with the Tarot de Marseille. I used the full deck, all 78 cards.

A woman in her fifties, divorced, inquires about her finances, which seem very difficult to manage. She has children and grandchildren, but lives alone.

The first thing that catches my eye, in the middle line, is the hermit and the fool both looking outside. That gives a first impression that she does not want to face her problems. She is more inclined to look for the reasons of these financial difficulties at the wrong place, the hermit is not illuminating anything useful. And the fool has a tendency to run away from problems. An attitude which is a little bit like I don’t want to see what’s going on, and I’ll abandon the needed effort to solve my problems.

That’s an interesting fact, when considering that 8 of swords in the middle of the spread. In a scale of 1 to 10, 8 is a lot of problems, that she does not want to face. It certainly also can represent all the fears she’s facing.

The 2 of cups, together with the empress, might show too much spending for her wellbeing, too much spending on what is not important. The 2 of cups could also represents children or grandchildren, and too much spending done for them: in that case, the empress would be the mother or grandmother spending too much for her love interests, the 2 of cups. Whatever is it, Justice shows that good judgement is required to balance these spending, and certainly cut what is spent for overindulging. 

If we look at the last line, the 3 of swords shows that problems can increase quickly, as 3 per definition is an extension, an expansion. So, if no change is coming, she can expect an increase of problems, that would block her (the wands crossing each other), from coming with a new financial plan, as showed in the 8 of coins. 

The numbers of of cards on the last line seem significant. The 3 reminds us of the empress, too much spending for her well being is increasing the problems. The 2 8’s are a remembrance of justice, time to take decisions and come with a plan on how to work out the financial aspect.

It’s quite interesting that the shadow card, the last card of the deck, is the queen of cups. This cards reminds us a lot of the empress, there is a feeling here of passivity in face of her situation.

Deck: Jean Noblet, restored by JC Flornoy.