Why the Rider-Waite?

I’ve always been a more traditional person, but that doesn’t mean I don’t have modern ideas. It also doesn’t mean that I own a Tarot deck three times the size of a deck of normal playing cards. In fact, I own three decks, four if you count a deck of oracle cards based on the Celtic tree zodiac. I digress.

 

The Rider-Waite has been my go-to Tarot deck (and form of divination) for two of the three to four years I have read the cards. They are quite contradictory in a sense and here is why—while they are simple to interpret with their traditional symbols and archetypes, they are chockfull of meanings that make it possible for anyone to have their own unique interpretations. This does make it tough, but in the end it doesn’t matter what other say about the cards—it’s all on YOU and how YOU interpret them.

 

A brief history—the Rider-Waite was first introduced in the early 20^th century by British mystic Arthur E. Waite, who was a Freemason and a member of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn during his lifetime. The original cards were large enough to take up an entire table if a Celtic Cross spread was used, let’s just say. The better known of the much older Tarot decks in history was the Marseilles, which if you look at both kinds of cards in each arcana, they look quite different. The Rider-Waite deck has become one of the most popular in the English-speaking world.

 

The Rider-Waite was not my first deck, however—the Golden Tarot was my first, and it was good for the time because the minor arcana was simplistic. Yet it was lacking…so the Rider-Waite, paired with my intuitive gifts, has proven most useful and accurate to me and those for whom I read.

 

SOURCES CITED:

-http://www.autorbis.net/arthur-edward-waite