The Fool in the Mythic Tarot

I learned tarot from the Mythic Tarot deck. As I experimented with different decks I started to realise that although every deck was based on similar ‘book’ readings, each deck has different meanings and indeed each card can have a different interpretation in new readings depending on its placement and the cards around it. Tarot isn’t strict with interpretations … how do the images on the card trigger your intuition? … It does help though to read different interpretations based on images on the cards and I thought I would work through the Major Tarot of the Mythic tarot deck, this deck which remains one of my favourites based on ancient myths.

The Fool is number zero in the tarot … the zero point, the very beginning. In this image we see Dionysus about to step off the edge of a cliff. He looks relaxed, carefree almost. Perched on a branch above him is an eagle. Behind him is a cave and in the background can be seen a landscape of sandy dunes. A path runs through the middle.

Dionysus is the child of Zeus, the King of the Gods, the God of Law and Order, Justice, the Sky and Lightening and Semele, a mortal princess who was seduced by Zeus. Semele was visited by Zeus in the night. He was felt as a divine presence so Semele never ‘saw’ her lover. When Hera, Zeus’s wife found out about the pregnancy, she visited Semele in disguise and put doubts in Semele’s mind that her lover was in fact a God. Semele demanded to Zeus to prove his divinity and he loved her so much he did. Only mortals cannot look upon Zeus without being incinerated which was Semele’s sad Fate but notbefore Zeus rescued the unborn baby and sewed him into his thigh until Dionysis was born which led him to being called the Twice Born.

So, Dionysus, the Twice Born, was associated with rebirth and death. He was celebrated in the spring, a time associated with birth and renewal. Dionysus was the God of fertility of nature, the vine and agriculture and God of light and ecstasy. He lived among men, sharing their suffering. He showed compassion and generosity to others around him. He was taught religious rites by the goddess Rhea and he set out in the world, teaching people the cultivation of the vine, during his wanders. Hera, still angry about his birth, eventually cursed this handsome God with madness. Dionysus gifted mankind with wine that could bring both drunken ecstasy and spiritual redemption. In due course he took rose to Olympus, home of the gods, taking his rightful place at the right hand of Zeus.

The Fool is the first step of a new journey. Whenever anything new begins, we take on a new role, the role of the Fool … not certain where the journey might lead, excited about its implications but maybe nervous at the same time, a sense of caution keeping us wary. Conversely, a sense of impulse pushing us forward regardless. Which one might it be? Every new start is different. New starts can be anything from a new job, first date, first day at college, accepting a new offer. Due to the nature of change, it’s a time when we might feel vulnerable and uncertain but intuitively there’s often a feeling that this is a risk we have to take because it will lead us to learning something new and stepping out onto new paths will also move us forward along our life’s journey.