The Lovers over the Centuries
A study of The Lovers card.
It’s Gemini Season so let’s talk Lovers Card.
The Lovers is one of the cards that has changed the most over the years. Let’s start with The Marseille, preceding the Golden Dawn. (Quick sidebar: The Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn is credited with infusing the tarot with all of its zodiacal, Hebrew, and Qabalistic attributes. It’s happened and evolved through history, but the Golden Dawn is the ones that solidified it into a system).
CBD Tarot de Marseille by Dr. Yoav Ben-Dov
The Marseille tarot is a French system, and while English decks have translated the card to the plural “The Lovers”, in French L’Amoureux translates to a single “The Lover”.
I find this card to be very dynamic and interesting because it lends itself to so many interpretations. At face value, we see a male figure in between a young woman, and an older woman.
Possible face value interpretations are:
A man is choosing between his new wife and his mother.
A man is choosing between his wife and her mother.
A man is choosing between two women.
These interpretations fit well with the Lovers title as he’s in between making a relationship decision, and we do have Cupid flying around on top. Cupid being a known trickster, he could be causing havoc. However, the keywords Decision and Choices are more accurate, I find. The center figure has to choose a path, and regardless of gender or relationships we, as humans, have to make a decision, or many, throughout life.
A more esoteric interpretation of this card could be…
The man is choosing between youth, represented by the younger woman, and maturity represented by the older woman. Does he have a Peter Pan complex? Or is he ready to face adulthood?
Let’s go a little deeper:
The young woman is wearing a golden crown (in the version pictured, the CBD Tarot de Marseille, her golden crown is hidden with her blonde hair, giving a nod to the secrets that the uninitiated may not be meant to recognize), and the older woman is wearing a crown of vine leaves. The women represent the twofold soul of mankind (spiritual and animal). This card represents the man’s parting of the ways. Where he must choose between what is temporary and what is eternal, the passage and changes of time, life, and journey. The two women also represent his angel self, and the other his demon self.
You ever heard of the Indigenous fable of the two wolves that live inside us? One light, one shadow, and whichever one wins over our minds and destiny is the one we feed. Well, The Lovers card is an interpretation of that fable. Which one do you choose?
The Lover, the male center figure, is in love with youth and pleasure, but he must choose to let temporary pleasures go for the, perhaps uncertain, maturity of the future.
Flying above, while it looks a lot like Cupid choosing on which lady to strike his arrow, notice that he is surrounded by light, a star. He is not Cupid, but the genius of fate. Rather, his north star, his fate or destiny. Notice that in the pictured version the arrow is pointing more towards the young woman, symbolizing that his path could end in destruction. Although he has, we all have, free will and the price of free will is responsibility, maturity, and discipline.
Now let’s move forward in history, and look at the Golden Dawn tarot, which looks wildly different from the Marseille. Actually they all look wildly different, so you’re hear me say that a few times.
Golden Dawn Tarot by Robert Wang
In the Golden Dawn card, we’re looking at the Greek myth of Perseus and Andromeda.
The legend starts with Andromeda claiming she’s more beautiful than the daughter of the sea Gods, so Poseidon gets mad, floods the land, and sends a monster to inhabit the area. The only way this monster could be vanquished is if Andromeda is sacrificed.
She gets tied to the rock, and Perseus sees her and falls in love (classic damsel in distress with a hero who falls in love and wants to save her). Perseus slays the beast and the two live happily ever after.
In this version, Andromeda represents ourselves, our ego, our personalities, and our persona in this world. The beast represents our lower selves, ready to devour and destroy. While Perseus represents our higher selves. Coming from above he breaks the chains from the rock that represents our physical world, and we are now free to live as our higher selves.
This myth continues with the keywords of Decisions and Choices that describe this card. We can choose fear and stay trapped in our own destructive thoughts and patterns, or we can call upon our higher selves and break free, become Django Unchained, and choose to ascend.
Rider Waite Smith Tarot
Now, looking at the Rider Waite Smith Lovers, we see the familiar scene of Adam and Eve and the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, and the Tree of Ascension.
Edward Waite says that “the figures suggest youth, virginity, innocence, love before it was contaminated by gross material desire”. In my opinion this ties a bit with the Marseille version, choosing between the maturity of vulnerability and love, versus the temporary desires and pleasures of the material world.
Waite goes on to say that “a great winged figure with arms extended pouring down influences.” This can suggest openness to outside influences and help from unexpected sources.
The two trees behind the figures also tie in with the Marseille and with the Golden Dawn versions. The Tree of Knowledge with he serpents coiled in it represent earthly pleasures while the Tree of Ascension represent the upwards path of the tree. However one could argue that it’s the other way. The upward movement on the Qabalah Tree of Life is called the serpent path. Similar to the kundalini serpent waking and traveling up the spine, we too can choose to wake up and travel up the Tree of Life. While the downward path on the Tree of Life is called the lightning path, which is the path from Unity Source down to physical matter. Neither path is good or bad or the “right one”. We all do both at different times in our lives. It’s more about being awake and conscious.
Is your head spinning yet?
Let’s move on to our final Lovers version, in the Thoth deck.
Thoth Tarot
In this version, we see more of a wedding scene. Crowley sees this card as the alchemical marriage, meaning solve and coagula, dissolve and consolidate. Crowley also states that the main character in this card is neither the bride or groom but the child born from their union, symbolized in this card by the Orphic egg. He says that the Orphic egg “represents the essence of all life that comes under the formula of male and female.”
While that quote makes it sound like this card would be the Coagula half of Solve et Coagula, it’s actually the Solve part. Coagula is represented by Temperance/Art. The Lovers is Gemini while Temperance is Sagittarius. The two are zodiacal opposites on the wheel, so it makes sense that the two would be halves of a whole.
Temperance is the great alchemist, mixing and consolidating opposites. While The Lovers are a representation of those very opposites. The Lovers being Gemini, the twins, is more about being able to hold opposing thoughts and ideas rather than the consolidation of opposites. Crowley says “…the essence of analysis is the continuous see-saw of contradictory ideas. It’s a glyph of duality. The Orphic egg representing the union of the Lovers or opposite is really a nod to Temperance, a nod of what’s to come of this union.
I won’t go through every symbol in the Thoth Lovers or this is going be a real long blog. I’ll do a deep dive of the Thoth version only. But I do want to point out that Cupid, rather the star of genius, from the Marseille makes an appearance in this version. The arrow pointing dow is said to be sent by “the topmost point”, meaning Kether, Unity Source at the top of the Qabalistic Tree of Life. As if God above, our higher selves above, are calling our lower attentions and tendencies to look up, to look to the heavens so we may begin our ascension.
In all versions of this Key, no matter how different the design, the esoteric meaning is the same, Decisions and Choices. Solve et Coagula. They all mean the union of opposites. We see the Garden of Eden in the RWS version, which the soul was expelled but to which the soul will return. Similar to the Thoth version, that while we’re seeing a union of the two it really represents the yin yang, the opposites or differences in each one soul. Similar to the Golden Dawn version where the higher self comes to rescue and unite to the lower self, and highlighting its differences in the process while moving towards union. Similar to the Marseille version that while we may have choices in the physical world, our choices can either lead us to temptation or to salvation. And remember that your guardian angel, your north star is always pointing his arrow in the direction of our highest self. Follow that.
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