The Sun
joy · success · clarity · warmth
Card art: Pamela Colman Smith, 1909, for A. E. Waite. Public domain.
Trump 19
In a few words
- joy
- success
- clarity
- warmth
Full daylight. Joy, success, things going right and being seen to go right.
Upright
- Everything
- Full daylight. Joy, success, things going right and being seen to go right.
- Love
- Happiness that shows on your face. A warm bond; good news at home.
- Work
- Recognition, success, a project shining. Enjoy it and share the credit.
- Money
- Prosperity and gains. A good time for what you have worked for to pay.
- Myself
- Confidence, energy, a clear head. You know who you are today.
Material happiness, fortunate marriage, contentment.The Pictorial Key to the Tarot (1911), p. 284
Reversed
- Everything
- The sun behind a cloud: joy delayed, or success feeling hollow. It is still day.
- Love
- A small shadow on a good thing. Do not let a mood become a story.
- Work
- Praise that feels thin, or a win postponed. Keep going; the cloud moves.
- Money
- Gains smaller than hoped. Still gains. Be grateful and keep building.
- Myself
- Feeling less bright than you are. Step outside, literally.
The same in a lesser sense.The Pictorial Key to the Tarot (1911), p. 284
The card, as Waite described it
The naked child mounted on a white horse and displaying a red standard has been mentioned already as the better symbolism connected with this card. It is the destiny of the Supernatural East and the great and holy light which goes before the endless procession of humanity, coming out from the walled garden of the sensitive life and passing on the journey home. The card signifies, therefore, the transit from the manifest light of this world, represented by the glorious sun of earth, to the light of the world to come, which goes before aspiration and is typified by the heart of a child. But the last allusion is again the key to a different form or aspect of the symbolism. The sun is that of consciousness in the spirit—the direct as the antithesis of the reflected light. The characteristic type of humanity has become a little child therein—a child in the sense of simplicity and innocence in the sense of wisdom. In that simplicity, he bears the seal of Nature and of Art; in that innocence, he signifies the restored world. When the self-knowing spirit has dawned in the consciousness above the natural mind, that mind in its renewal leads forth the animal nature in a state of perfect conformity.The Pictorial Key to the Tarot (1911), p. 144
The plain-word meanings on this page were written for ShreeJyoti and are still under review.