This is the sixth in our planetary series covering each of the seven classical "planets" in the tarot. Featured in this show: our expansive All-Father Big J himself, Jupiter! - including his related astrology, Qabalah, powers, correspondences, Orphic hymn, and more!

If you haven't listened yet, you won't want to miss this week's special Fortune's Wheelhouse episode on tarot and the decans! featuring astrologer Austin Coppock. We cover crucial questions about decanic dignity, why tarot has such a specific emphasis on decans, and how to make use of these correspondences in your practice - with specific delineations for several favorite decanic minors (looking at you, Lord of Futility! and Lord of Gain! among others).

This is the sixth in our planetary series covering each of the seven classical "planets" in the tarot. Featured in this show: our expansive All-Father Big J himself, Jupiter! - including his related astrology, Qabalah, powers, correspondences, Orphic hymn, and more!

It is perhaps a measure of how busy things have been that I’ve completely forgotten to blog-post new Fortune’s Wheelhouse episodes, since we started Season 3 on June 6th. I apologize! I’ll retrofit blog posts as I have time.

In the meantime, Season 3 of Fortune’s Wheelhouse has begun with 7 planetary episodes. What’s a planetary episode? It’s an overview of how each of the seven traditional planets - Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Sun, Venus, Mercury, Moon - influences the iconography of the tarot. We started in reverse order, with the Moon.

We did it. We actually did it:  In 78 episodes and 82 weeks (we took a month's break between the major and minor arcana), Mel Meleen and I sailed from end to end of the Great Sea of Tarot.  We made final landfall at the Page of Pentacles or Princess of Disks, the earthy part of Earth.

The King or Knight of Pentacles/Disks is the fiery part of earth, associated with the 7 of Wands and the 8 and 9 of his suit: valor, prudence, gain. He has left behind his leonine warrior days for the hard work of peace; he is the sacrificial harvest king who ensures plenty for his people.  Efficient and material-minded, he keeps a strong and steady hand on the threshing flail, ensuring every last grain is counted or consumed. 

Are we here already? It is a little bittersweet to come to the end of the numbered cards, although we still have the four court cards of the Pentacles/Disks to go. I have a real weakness for the numeric minors, and this one is one of my favorites. We have arrived, at last, at the Lord of Wealth.  Mercury governs the final decan of Virgo, sign of his rulership and exaltation.  Therefore the 10 of Pentacles or Disks holds the culmination of our material realm: here our worldly goods reach their maximum accumulation, and our bodies come to rest.  We return our legacies to the earth, a seed for the next generation.  We have transmuted our corruptible flesh into alchemical gold, only to begin the cycle anew.

Time is money and patience bears fruit in the 8 of Pentacles or Disks, the Lord of Prudence. The messenger god, at home everywhere, enters his rulership as we arrive in the sign of Virgo.  The Sun governs this decan, ripening the grain and bringing in the harvest.  Pantries and coffers fill even as the days shorten, ensuring another generation will thrive even if the previous one must pass onward.  Here the Hermit makes the Sun safe in his lantern for its long journey through darkness.