(Tarot Prompts for Writers)
Here’s a compilation of my notes on reading The High Priest as a card of the day or in a spread.
If you’re just learning tarot, use the deck that most appeals to you, and spend some time looking at your card. What does it say to you? (See my description of The High Priest as I see it.)
Tarot is personal and open-ended. There are traditional meanings — and yes, you should know them if you want to read tarot cards — but it really only “works” if you follow what the cards mean to you personally. Your priest and my priest may not mean quite the same thing.
Number
The High Priest has the number 5, which represents energies that need to be balanced. It’s about inspiration, creative thought, moral law, intellectual synthesis, and a rounding out of life. It also represents independence of thought and action, sometimes to the point of inability to conform.
Name
The High Priest represents established thought and religion. He is respected and has a formal, likely earned position. He knows, carries, and upholds the inherited wisdom of past ages. He is a shepherd to his flock. Don’t let the history of religious oppression put him in a bad light. There’s his rigid theology, yes, but also the sacred and righteous things within it.
Placement
The High Priest follows the Emperor and Empress, who represent the earthly realm; he represents movement to a community’s spiritual aspirations. He comes after the High Priestess, who is more mysterious and individual than he; you might approach the High Priestess privately, whereas the High Priest is part of a social order that strives for spiritual strength and knowledge and community. The beginning of the deck and of your journey is filled with figures from whom you could get advice.
Traditional interpretations
The High Priest represents spiritual matters; he’s a bridge between the body (life) and spirit (afterlife). Ask him for advice. Don’t fear his authority — he strives to be good and helpful. He is willing to reveal all he knows and he has (or thinks he has) your best interests at heart.
The card often refers to institutions (hospitals, schools, government, church), as the High Priest belongs to the world of institutions, not of nature like the High Priestess. He is the ruling power of formal religion; he upholds the accepted behavioural code and he teaches traditional thoughts and ways. His teachings are practical, and his insights are bound by a traditional framework.
He is not a man of mystery, but the card usually indicates inspiration, revelation, or wisdom. Good counsel or teaching; help from a trusted source. Freedom through knowledge. It also tells of social support, mercy and goodness, and important alliances. It can warn of servitude, captivity, rigidity, and unquestioned customs.
The card brings a message of temperance and balance, of leaning on established mores to find the good way, and of balancing the individual will with social good. The High Priest lives according to a carefully planned regimen and deeply thought-out rules. See the good in that. He’s about discipline, in his own way: the discipline required to follow the good life, to stick to the moral path.
Reverse interpretations
The High Priest can be a good omen reversed, signifying an unconventional spirit that will serve you well; it advises you not to aim for approval but rather to seek a solution through wisdom.
More often, the card reversed warns of misinformation, misrepresentation, slander and propaganda, a distortion of truth; bad advice; or power achieved by hiding information. It can warn of treachery and weakness, and it advises you to postpone making any long-term commitments until you have a better grasp of how things are.
Thematic readings
- In love, the card advises you to take a traditional path. It can indicate financial stability, practical values, a strong relationship, even marriage. This is not a time to experiment. But the card can indicate pressure to conform — are you pressuring someone? Are you bowing to pressure? Are you pressuring yourself to do what’s expected? Don’t commit until you are sure this is right for you.
- In work, the card suggests that you tend to play it too safe. You are seeking approval from your colleagues rather than focussing on the work itself. Sometimes it’s important to put the interests of the group over those of the individual, but make sure you are doing what’s right.
- In general life, the card indicates that you need to find a deeper meaning to life. Explore your spirit. Find a supportive community.
Specific positions
- Current situation: It may be difficult to implement change. Follow traditional values and ethics. Who are you to blow against the wind? You may have to do whatever is expected of you in order to meet your goals. This is not the time to buck authority.
- Past influence: Traditions and conventions have influenced you, for good or ill. Someone may have withheld information from you.
- Outcome: Seek wisdom and an inner life. Start with traditional paths and teachings — they’ll help you understand yourself and your life. You may be about to meet someone who will be a major influence on your choices and your spirit. Consider sticking to the path, or at least walking it for a while before you leave it.
- Blocked: The card shows resistance to change; inflexibility. You are stuck in your ways. You need to fight a restrictive history or a restricting person in order to liberate yourself. But keep an open mind. Don’t assume you know better than others. What society deems is right may actually be right.
Questions for the Querent
- Do you see this card as a person or an idea? Are there elements of the High Priest in you?
- Do you have any reaction at first sight of this card? What do you focus on?
- What do you think of this character? Is it soothing and wise or restrictive and autocratic? (To find the good in it, I think of it as the inherited wisdom of past ages, including literature and philosophy.)
- Do you follow a religious path? Has religion played any role in your life?
- Could the High Priest represent a person in your life?
- Do you follow any guidelines for a good life? Is there something missing?
- Do you have social support? Are you afraid to ask for help?
Keywords to aid Memory
- Balance of individual and community
- Knowledge; Wisdom; Insight
- Traditional path and Teaching
Images on this page are by the following artists: Banner, left to right: Marseilles deck engraved by Nicolas Conver; Dragon Tarot illustrated by Roger and Linda Garland; Tarot Balbi by Domenico Balbi; Gilded Tarot by Ciro Marchetti (also shown alone in the box); Druid Craft deck illustrated by Will Worthington; Radiant Rider-Waite deck illustrated by Pamela Colman Smith.
Catherine Austen 