Almost everyone I’ve talked to about this card just loves what Ciro Marchetti has done with it. Renamed Faith and showing four different religious traditions, it does have a more inclusive feel. Ciro’s stated goal was to show that despite differences in practice or theology, all religions share a common core of faith. This changes the focus from teachings or practices to a more fundamental one of faith or belief. It is a subtle shift but an intriguing and an important one. What are your thoughts on this card, both the new name and the image? After a month of thinking about The Hierophant and reading the comments of others, how has your understanding changed? What was

Tell me, does this ever happen to you: you discover a new deck that you just love…except for one card, and that one card is bad that it makes you not want to work with that deck? This card almost pushes me that far. The Tarot of the Dream Enchantress, like the Manga Tarot, plays with gender, but in a different way. In Dream Enchantress, which is a very feminine deck, the cards that are traditionally male wear a mask. Sometimes it seems that a female figure is wearing the mask and sometimes it is impossible to tell, as in the case of the Hierophant. I did write the text for the booklet (although I had nothing to do with the design of this deck). For this card, I thought: Where

I included this deck just to try and make your brains explode. This is another compelling deck designed by my friend Riccardo Minetti. In this deck he plays with the idea of gender and how it influences our understanding of the cards. In the Manga Tarot, all the cards that are traditionally male are depicted as female and vice versa. Arcana V becomes The Priestess, and looks very much like a traditional High Priestess card. Arcana II becomes The Priest. For ease of discussion, I’ve pictured them together here. Many of us blend associations of the card’s number in with the name, image, symbolism, and other associations together to create a card’s meaning. When a deck

The other day I mentioned that I often thought of the Hierophant as the Teacher. Perhaps one of the many reasons I love The Gaian Tarot so much is that it names and depicts Arcana V as The Teacher. The creator, Joanna Powell Colbert, says that this card is the Humble Teacher, as in a Holy Fool or Crazy Saint. The emphasis here is (as it was in the Fey Tarot's Hierophant) less about tradition or formal education and more about wisdom, teaching, and learning. Taking The Hierophant in this direction raises questions about the importance of tradition (is it important?), about the role tradition should or shouldn’t play in teaching or education. Is Arcana V still Arcana V as The