Meditations on the Nine of Swords

Today is the first day of the impeachment hearings. I drew a card from the Legacy of the Divine Tarot Deck, and was met with the Nine of Swords, traditionally called ‘the nightmare card’ or ‘Lord of Cruelty’ and a long time staple in many of my personal readings. It’s a card of past traumas coming to haunt you, of trauma in general, and of the cruelty of the mind. It’s one of the cards that I like to see the art for before I purchase a deck.

As with all nine-cards in a tarot deck, this shows someone alone. (I’ve seen some exceptions, such as the Tarot of the New Vision, shown below). The implication is that there are some things which we must face alone, which definitely includes nightmares and demons within our minds.

Nines (in both major and minor arcana) explore what happens in our personal space, what happens in the key life moments where we find ourselves alone, perhaps considering what what our next moves will be. Because of all of the strife shown in the nine of swords it’s a card meant to tell the querant to take heed, to listen to the warnings — it’s like a dire attempt of the tarot to get your attention. I was taught that the tarot shows you a mutable future — a future that has yet to be, that will only manifest if you continue your current path. The nine of swords is the ‘turn back now’ warning. It also indicates that fate will have a play, as the blanket covering the person has astrological symbols quilted on it in the Rider-Waite deck.

The swords always dominate the image, hanging over the head of the person. Nightmares, absolutely — self-made nightmares? Perhaps.

This is a viscerally scary card. It shows what happens when fear and anxiety take over your mental space — they keep you up at night. Part of the experience of being human is your own mind setting against itself — and the airy suit of swords is meant to teach us many lessons about the strength of our minds.

When I meditate about what the Lord of Cruelty has to teach, it is the old adage that pain is inevitable, but suffering is optional.