Jewish Mysticism Archieven

To Yod or Not?

On a number of Tarot cards in the RWS deck you can see drop-like things. On the Tower and on three of the aces (Cups, Swords, Wands) they are very visible. With the Cups they look like drops of water, with the Wands they look like leaves. But what are they about the in the Swords suit? What do these drops symbolize and why was the Ace of Pentacles skipped?

The different number of Yods on Tarotcard ‘The Tower’

On a number of Tarotcards you can find ‘Yods’. The Yod is the tenth Hebrew letter and means “the creative hand of God.” The Yod as a letter is assigned to Tarotcard IX the Hermit by occultists who follow the Golden Dawn as a system (others sometimes assign it to Tarotcard X The Wheel of Fortune). The Yod is depicted on the Aces, the Tower, the Moon and on some decks also on the Sun. There it represents a ‘divine spark’.

In this post I would like to elaborate on the number of Yods that appear on Tarot card ‘The Tower’. This differs per deck and that is no coincidence! All occultists have had their own reasons for displaying exactly that number of Yods on the card. I’ve listed a few for decks that I own myself, but I’m sure there are many more decks that show a different number of Yods.

Ace of Swords or The Game Genie of Tarot

According to the bible, Moses received the two stone tablets with 10 commandments from God on Mount Sinai. Not only did the Tablets contain valuable information on how to behave, they were written by God’s own finger! According to Jewish tradition, God also gave him the complete Jewish Bible + interpretation.

Forget about the tablets, forget about the Bible. Because according to the Talmud, Moses also received a goodie bag containing some small presents from the angels. And those presents are many times more interesting! Moreover, 1 of those presents leads us to Ace of Swords in the Tarot …