When Thought Becomes Theater

It’s absolutely creepy how academia can generate modes of thinking that actually prevent thought. I just saw a new tarot deck claiming to “decolonize tarot.”

I can't stop wondering what that even means.

Tarot originated in Christian Renaissance Europe as a set of playing cards, not as a colonized object. It was never imposed on indigenous cultures. In fact, over the centuries, it’s been "culturally appropriated" (to use another slippery term) by esotericists, spiritualists, Jungians, New Agers, art nerds, cat fanciers, and everyone in between.

If academic language were at all consistent or rooted in historical logic, “decolonizing tarot” should mean returning tarot to its roots in the art, symbolism, and Christian cosmology of Renaissance Italy. But that’s clearly not what the authors of this guidebook mean.

Words like “decolonize” are incantations ("dog whistles," perhaps) with no clear definitions or historical grounding. They are reducing rich, complex traditions into ideological props to support whatever moral performance someone is trying to stage.

In the case of The Decolonized Tarot Illustrated Guidebook: A Diverse Approach to Divination by Maritess Zurbano and Cathleen Abalos, the term is simply a catchword for advertising and self-delusion. They use the Rider-Waite-Smith deck (arguably the most Eurocentric deck) to support a claim that Filipino-American culture "by default, embraces all others."

Filipino-American culture has been shaped in part by a long and complicated history of colonization: Chinese, Islamic, Spanish Catholic, and American. To portray it as universally inclusive by default is not just inaccurate, it’s erasure. Zurbano and Abalos flatten out real cultural tensions and colonial entanglements for the sake of feel-good universality. It’s syncretism dressed in buzzwords, marketing disguised as academic theory.

Their work is not a search for truth. It’s the use of an academic buzz word to shut down inquiry, overwrite complexity, and manufacture consent for vague ideological goals. The "language of liberation" is being used to obscure rather than reveal. This is academic cosplay without the burden of thought.

I'm all for cultural change. I'm even in favor of syncretism, as long as we acknowledge that’s what it is. But we can't evolve if we aren’t allowed to think clearly. And we definitely can’t think clearly if every act of questioning is met with moral panic, and every idea is wrapped in jargon that conceals more than it reveals.

The most useful (and radical) thing we can do is ask questions that make sense and use language that helps us think.

Updated Cards!

Somehow, I'd never noticed that Pamela's Wheel of Fortune contains the Havayah! (I just assumed the Hebrew letters around the wheel said תורה.) So I cropped that RWS image in my deck, which then made it necessary to crop all the card images throughout the deck. As a result, the Eilat Tarot is much improved!

Here are some of the new and improved Image Cards, representing the dimension of Nefesh:

Here are a couple of the revised Number Cards, representing the dimension of Shanah:

Here are three of the new Letter Cards, representing the dimension of Olam:

Part 1, Chapter 2 - Revisions in Progress

Chapter Two
The Structure of the Deck

Relationship with Traditional Tarot

The Eilat Tarot retains the traditional tarot structure of seventy-eight cards. The structure of twenty-two Major Arcana cards and fifty-six Minor Arcana cards has been reframed through the lens of Jewish mysticism.

In a traditional deck, the 78 cards can be grouped as the Major and Minor Arcana. The Major Arcana can be divided between The Fool and the other twenty-one Major Arcana cards. The Minors can be grouped into their four suits, or into forty pip cards [14] and sixteen court cards.

In the Eilat Tarot, the Major Arcana cards have been renamed Letter Cards, each bearing one of the twenty-two letters of the Hebrew alef-bet and representing creative forces in the universe and mythic themes in human life. The Minor Arcana have been renamed Number Cards and Image Cards. These address everyday life and the personal stories that shape us. All three arcana of the Eilat Tarot explore the experiences that shape us.

The Number Cards focus on the dimension of time in the human journey. Time is intangible, yet it is more than a category of the mind. Years ago, a group of Israeli students, former soldiers studying Torah and Western literature after their military service, challenged me to define time without using the word itself. That question stayed with me. The multiplicity of calendars humanity has created—Sumerian, Vedic, Mayan, Zoroastrian, Islamic, Hindu, Gregorian, and many others—suggests that time is not only measured but also invested with meaning. Time invites change. It makes growth possible.

The Number Cards are rooted in sacred time: Jewish festivals, the Hebrew year in the Land of Israel, and the phases of the moon. Time is both abstract and concrete: we cannot touch it, yet we see the moon wax and wane, the seasons turn. Time is both linear and cyclical: children grow, friends age, and still the year circles back to its beginning.

We cannot pin down what time is. It frightens us with its limits, but those rare moments when time seems to dissolve can feel like touching the face of God. Time also challenges us: a time comes when a woman can no longer bear children; a time comes when each of us must face death.

While the Number Cards mark the passage of time, the Image Cards remind us that every human is made in the image of God, b’tzelem Elokim. Time marks our journey but it is our relationships that give that journey depth. After offering the priestly blessing, Rabbi Alan Berg concludes each service with the words, “When we look into each other’s eyes, let us remember we are looking into the eyes of God.”

Together, the Number and Image Cards tell personal stories, grounded in spirit, time, and earthly experience.

[continue editing here]

Soul, Time, and World

The Eilat Tarot is built around three interwoven dimensions of being: Soul, Time, and World, nefesh (נֶפֶשׁ), shanah (שָׁנָה), and olam (עוֹלָם). This structure is inspired by the Sefer Yetzirah’s vision of creation [15]. Each of these dimensions is addressed by a distinct group of cards, which together form the three arcana of the Eilat Tarot.

Image Cards - Tzelemot (צְלָמוֹת)
Dimension of Nefesh (נֶפֶשׁ)
The human soul; its desires, struggles, and revelations. These cards reflect humans made in the image of God (b’tzelem Elokim) and explore how we live, choose, and love.

Number Cards - Moadot (מוֹעֲדוֹת)
Dimension of Shanah (שָׁנָה)
The cycles of time; growth, return, and transformation. These cards align with the Jewish calendar, daily rhythms, and the flow of the sefirot through spiritual seasons.

Letter Cards - Netivot (נְתִיבוֹת)
Dimension of Olam (עוֹלָם)
The vastness of space and the mystery of form. These cards are named for the Hebrew letters, each a path (netiv) on the Tree of Life. They represent cosmic principles and archetypal forces.

While every card in the deck touches all three dimensions, this structure allows the reader to focus his or her attention through the lens of one arcana at a time.

A Depth of Good and a Depth of Evil

In the Eilat Tarot, the structure of Soul, Time, and World finds a further reflection in the ten amukim, or depths [16], described in the Sefer Yetzirah: north and south, east and west, above and below, good and evil, beginning and end. These five sets of polarities show how creation extends infinitely through space, time, and moral awareness. They are not fixed points but continua through which being and perception unfold.

Six of these depths are spatial, two are temporal, and two are ethical. The inclusion of moral polarity within the very structure of the cosmos sets Jewish mysticism apart from many other ancient systems, which focused solely on space and time [17].

The Sefer Yetzirah lists them as follows:

Ten Sefirot of Nothingness:
    Their measure is ten
    Which have no end
A depth of beginning
        A depth of end
A depth of good
        A depth of evil
A depth of above
        A depth of below
A depth of east
        A depth of west
A depth of north
        A depth of south
The singular Master
    God faithful King
    dominates over them all
    From His holy dwelling
    Until eternity of eternities.

-Sefer Yetzirah 1:5

Anyone who has waved a lulav and etrog in six directions during the festival of Sukkot [18] will feel the resonance of this passage since it invests those gestures with cosmic significance.

The second pair, a depth of good, a depth of evil, affirms that good and evil are deeply interwoven into existence. As Isaiah declares:

I am the Lord and there is no other—
Fashioning light and creating darkness,
Making peace and creating evil—
I am the Lord, making all these.”

-Isaiah 45:7 [19]

The preceding verse reminds us that every human being contains both the yetzer ha’tov (inclination toward good) and the yetzer ha’ra (inclination toward evil). Both are necessary, but they must be directed toward righteous ends.

In the Eilat Tarot:

• Number Cards trace time (a depth of beginning and a depth of end) seasons, cycles, transitions, and thresholds
• Letter Cards correspond to space (above and below, east and west, north and south) where God engraves the cosmos with sound and symbol
• Image Cards suggest ethical and psychological depths (a depth of good and a depth of evil) where inner conflict becomes the ground of transformation

Though each group of cards emphasizes one polarity, all the cards carry moral resonance, for it is we, as conscious beings, who consult them.

Suits and Elemental Directions in the Land

The Number Cards and Image Cards are divided into four suits. Each suit includes ten Number Cards and four Image Cards. In traditional tarot, the suits reflect aspects of human experience. Cups address emotion and relationships, to intuition and connection. Swords illuminate thought, communication, and mental challenges. Wands express the energy of passion, creative work, and the desire to grow. Pentacles relate to the material world: sustenance, shelter, and the miracle of embodiment.

In the Eilat Tarot, each suit carries additional layers of meaning. Each is linked to an element, a direction, a dimension of being, and a type of prayer. These associations are not only symbolic; they are rooted in the Land itself.

These elemental associations are grounded not just in the classical Greek tradition, but in the landscape and geography of Eilat. At the edge of Eilat stands an ancient burial ground, where the circular bases of prehistoric tombs still stand. Skulls, and even an Asherah pole [20], were excavated there. From this hilltop, the turquoise sea, the red hills of Edom [21], and the unfolding landscape stretch outward in the blinding sunlight. Trails lead away in all directions, and each month, families gather there to watch the full moon rise.

In moments of solitude, I would stand among those stones and turn toward each direction, blessing what lay beyond. To the west, the hills rise toward Sinai. To the north, the Negev opens in bright silence. To the east, the moon climbs over the hills of Jordan. To the south, the sea shimmers toward the horizon. Above me, I sensed the Divine Presence. Beneath me, the Land [22] held me in stillness.

In those moments, the elements were not symbolic. They were alive.

In traditional tarot, suits are often linked to the classical elements, but not always logically. Wands, made of wood, are tied to fire, which can consume them, while Swords, forged in fire, are linked to air. I wrestled with these pairings for years. In the Eilat Tarot, I allowed direction, geography, and prayer to reshape them:

West / Earth / Pentacles: Torah was given in the wilderness of Sinai, to the west of Eilat. The Hebrew word ma'arav (מַעֲרָב) comes from a root meaning “to mix” or “to promise,” evoking the setting sun, the meeting of opposites, and the promise of renewal. This is the place of grounding, completion, and integration. It is the essence of earth.

North / Fire / Wands: North of Eilat are the ancient sanctuaries, including Shiloh, Dan, Arad, and Jerusalem, where offerings were made in fire. The Hebrew tzafon (צָפוֹן) means “hidden” or “concealed,” evoking mystery [23] and intensity. Fire here is not comforting warmth but transformative danger that must be approached with reverence.

East / Air / Swords: Before sunrise in Eilat, the sun sends a fleeting cool breeze toward the city, even in the height of summer. Mizrach (מִזְרָח) means “shining,” while kedem (קֶדֶם) means both “before” and “origin.” The east is the place of clarity, beginning, and voice. Breath becomes word; thought becomes form.

South / Water / Cups: To the south lies the Gulf of Aqaba, near where tradition says the Israelites crossed the Sea of Reeds. That crossing out of Mitzrayim [24] was both an escape and a spiritual birth. The Hebrew words for ‘south’ include darom (דָּרוֹם), which connotes radiance, and negev (נֶגֶב) which connotes dryness. The southern desert, the Negev, has long been considered a “place of purification.” The desert teaches through scarcity; thirst awakens the soul and silence allows us to hear the still small voice. Water there is drawn from rock or remembered in story, like Miriam’s well, hidden like emotion until it rises. Water's presence is felt even when unseen. It shapes everything.

The four directions are aligned with four sefirot, which will be described later in this chapter:

Chesed (South)
Tiferet (East)
Gevurah (North)
Yesod (West)

Up (Netzach) and down (Hod) complete the six spatial directions.

The Sefer Yetzirah teaches that God “sealed” each of these directions with letters of the Divine Name (1:13), marking them as sacred boundaries against chaos and through which divine energy may flow into creation. In this vision, every direction is a gate through which holiness enters and sustains the world. By sealing the six depths, God marked the boundaries of creation and sanctified it.

This set of elemental directions also reflects a polarity central to Kabbalah: the interplay of masculine and feminine energies. Fire and water, north and south, are paired opposite each other as Father and Mother. Earth and air, west and east, are paired as Daughter and Son. Masculine and Feminine are generative forces whose tension sustains the world.

The Eilat Tarot invites not only the interpretation of symbols, but movement through them, to physically turn and face each direction, to meet the elements in the Land itself, and to feel how spirit, body, time, and space bind themselves into sacred coherence.

_____

Footnotes:

14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.

Part 1, Chapter 1 - Newly Re-Revised!

Introduction

The Eilat Tarot [1] was born in the desert, shaped by the stillness of Eilat, the shimmer of the Red Sea, and the quiet companionship of ancient texts. It draws on the familiar imagery of Pamela Colman Smith’s art and brings it into conversation with Jewish mysticism, especially the Sefer Yetzirah [2] and the Tree of Life.

The first part of this companion book explains the deck's sources and structure. The second part explores possible meanings of each individual card.

Chapter 1 - Reflections

Rather than offer a formal introduction to either tarot or Kabbalah, this chapter shares the inspiration behind the Eilat Tarot. I reference some of the books and decks that shaped this project. The Eilat Tarot is the result of decades of study, practice, and living. Much of what I’ve learned has become second nature, with roots I can no longer trace. I offer my heartfelt thanks, and my apologies, to the many teachers, artists, and thinkers whose insights have shaped this work but go unnamed in these pages.

Tarot as Companion

In high school, a friend had a tarot deck that she never used because some cards were missing. After graduating in 1983 and moving to the "big city," I began a search for my own tarot deck. After many months, I finally found one–in a toy store of all places! It was David Palladini’s Aquarian Tarot. The images intrigued and puzzled me. Bookstores at the time carried only one guidebook: A.E. Waite’s Pictorial Key to the Tarot, a famously cryptic text. So for years, I shuffled the cards and gazed at them, learning the images by heart but not understanding what they meant.

Eventually, I came across Norma Cowie’s excellent book, Exploring the Patterns of the Tarot. Over the decades, I have filled its margins with notes and ideas. That spine-broken volume, now housed in a small three-ring binder, is still my most loved tarot guide.

Later still, The Robin Wood Tarot, featuring brighter, more narrative imagery, helped me understand tarot symbolism a little better. Isabel Radow Kliegman’s Tarot and the Tree of Life spelled out the link between the numbered Minor Arcana cards and the ten sefirot [3] of Kabbalah, and between the court cards and the Four Worlds.

It had always seemed to me that Kabbalah and tarot are two distinct traditions which, for some reason, people really wanted to link to one another. I knew tarot and Kabbalah were distinct traditions, yet I kept trying to find the figures, stories, and lessons of Torah in the cards.

Three decades after I bought my first tarot deck, Donald Tyson’s Portable Magic offered a clear explanation of the Golden Dawn’s [4] restructuring of the Major Arcana. After reading that book, I began making notes and outlines for my own tarot deck.

The Raziel Tarot by Rachel Pollack [5] and Robert Place revealed that tarot could be renewed through authentic Jewish learning and mystical tradition. Eugene Vinitski's artistic and beautiful Tarot of Magical Correspondences suggested to me how I, not an artist by any means, might create a colorful deck of my own through collage. (Ultimately, that's not how I created the Eilat Tarot, but the inspiration kept me working on ideas for a deck. In the end, the deck resembles my original vision for it, which coincidentally, is very similar to Vinitski's earlier Kabbalistic Tarot.)

Over the years, my understanding of the tarot cards evolved alongside my life. I can see that growing understanding in the changing notes I wrote in the margins of Norma Cowie’s book. The cards helped me make sense of events and better understand myself. More importantly, they helped me stay grounded in a world that is always changing.

The world challenges us because it is always changing. That challenge is what spurs us to continue seeking and questioning. Tools like tarot or the weekly parashah [6] offer steady points of reference in life’s shifting currents. These images and texts help us stay rooted as we grow, offering new insights each time we return to them.

Over time, I stopped treating the cards as something that knew more than I did, and began seeing them as mirrors of my own soul. They didn’t answer my questions; they helped me ask better ones.

In his commentary on the Sefer Yetzirah, Aryeh Kaplan suggests that the text is less about contemplating mystical symbols and more about cultivating a way of seeing the world [7]. That insight resonated with me. Tarot helped me develop my own conscious view of the world.

My Journey with Kabbalah

My introduction to Jewish mysticism began with The Way of Splendor by Edward Hoffman which I read about eleven years after I bought my first tarot deck. Hoffman's book offered an accessible entry point into the history of Jewish mysticism and eventually led me to deeper study. Lawrence Kushner’s work was elusive and when Danny Matt taught a class on the Zohar at my synagogue, using a Kinko’s copy of what would later become his famous translation, I appreciated his warmth, but understood no part of the text.

At the UAHC Meditation Kallah in Prescott, Arizona in 2000 and 2001, Rabbi Ted Falcon introduced me to Kabbalistic prayer and meditation. After that, I was shocked to learn, in Robert Wang’s The Rape of Jewish Mysticism by Christian Theologians, that Renaissance theologians had studied Kabbalah to aid their efforts to convert Jews. (Later, they become captivated by its spiritual beauty, and reframed it in Christian terms, making it foundational to Western occultism [8].)

I abandoned tarot briefly, feeling it was not part of a Jewish life journey. Eventually, I realized that it is an essential component of my spiritual life, helping me to connect with my intuition and know myself. (Intuition is so central to a good life that I sometimes wonder if it comes from the soul–except that I’m certain it arises in my body. But maybe those aren’t opposites. If I take the Shema, the declaration that God is One, to its logical conclusion, then perhaps the body is soul. Then again, God is transcendent as well as immanent. Maybe intuition is an expression of body and soul working together.) Surprisingly, it was studying a Jewish text in a six week course on Sefer Yetzirah taught by Rabbi Jill Hammer, that returned me to my tarot project.

Aryeh Kaplan’s translation and commentary on the Sefer Yetzirah arrived at a significant time in my life. It became a companion while living in Eilat, during my struggles with aliyah [11], and in the months before a series of surgeries that would save and transform my life. The mystical path doesn’t yield to effort alone; it opens only when we’re ready.

Tarot and Kabbalah

Many tarot decks include Hebrew letters on the cards, suggesting a long-standing connection between tarot and Kabbalah. In fact, the two systems arose in entirely different cultures and for different purposes. Tarot emerged in 15th-century Christian Europe as a set of playing cards, which only later took on divinatory and esoteric meanings.

Kabbalah, by contrast, is the Jewish mystical tradition, rooted in antiquity and still evolving. It explores the revelation and concealment of the Divine, the transmission of Torah, and the nature of creation itself. Its symbols, ethics, rituals, and stories arise from and inform Jewish life and learning.

Over the centuries, people have noticed resonances between the two traditions. There are twenty-two Major Arcana cards in the tarot and twenty two letters in the Hebrew alphabet. There are ten numbered cards in each suit of the tarot and ten sefirot on the Tree of Life. The Golden Dawn’s system of correspondences sought to unify tarot, astrology, alchemy, and Kabbalah into one symbolic framework. Syncretism is not new. In the ancient Mediterranean world, spiritual traditions often borrowed, blended, and reshaped one another. Greek philosophy left its mark on Jewish mysticism, just as Jewish thought helped shape the spiritual imagination of late antiquity.

While Kabbalah is not an inherent part of tarot, Jewish writers and deck creators like Isabel Radow Kliegman, Rachel Pollack, and Betzalel Arieli have shown that it is possible to bring authentic Jewish thought into conversation with tarot [9]. The Eilat Tarot attempts to continue that conversation.

Inspiration for the Eilat Tarot

For decades, I searched for a tarot deck that felt genuinely Jewish, not one with Hebrew letters simply stamped on it, but one that engaged deeply with Jewish texts, themes, and questions. I wanted a deck that would resonate with Torah, not simply echo interpretations rooted in Christian occultism.

The Eilat Tarot emerged from my desire to combine tarot’s symbolic language with the spiritual and ethical wisdom of Judaism [10]. I believed that together, they could speak meaningfully about human experience.

I had struggled and failed to find figures or stories from Torah in the cards. However, Aryeh Kaplan’s translation and commentary on the Sefer Yetzirah showed me a poetic structure capable of illuminating tarot in new ways, not through rigid correspondences, but through the harmonies of nefesh, shanah, and olam (soul, time, and world) that are hinted at in the Sefer Yetzirah.

That book, a short enigmatic text, composed sometime between the 2nd and 10th centuries CE, was the foundation for later Kabbalistic mysticism and was distinct from the earlier Merkavah and Hekhalot traditions. Its meditations on letters, breath, and creation became central to the emergence of this deck.

I began studying the text while living in Eilat, just before a series of major surgeries that saved and transformed my life. The Sefer Yetzirah became a companion through pain, healing, and renewal. My study of it relied primarily on the English translation and did not include a knowledgeable teacher or chevruta [12], so my conclusions may be quirky, but I hope they are meaningful.

I came to understand why so many people have linked this particular Jewish text to the cards. Kaplan’s commentary, grounded in his careful translation, helped me imagine a tarot rooted in Jewish thought and shaped by Jewish questions, a tarot that would not dictate fixed meanings, but invite the reader into the unfolding experience of revelation.

The southern city of Eilat, with its desert, mountains, and sea, gave the deck its name. I found in that silence and solitude a place where I could study and listen to the shimmering presence of creation. Out of that stillness, a vision of tarot began to take form.

After creating the deck, I found a book that I had read years earlier, Carol Bridges’s The Medicine Woman Inner Guidebook. Her work may have influenced the structure of the Eilat Tarot, more than I was aware while creating it.

Equally as significant as Kaplan's text was the influence of my best friend, Arlan Wareham, who taught me by example that a logical mind can live in harmony with a reverent spirit. He also showed me that our outlook shapes how the world meets us. His unwavering optimism, grounded in kindness and thoughtfulness, has been one of my greatest sources of wisdom. Mr. Pollyanna [13] has been my finest teacher.

The Eilat Tarot does not attempt to make tarot “fit” Kabbalah. Instead, it simply brings the Rider-Waite imagery into conversation with the Sefer Yetzirah, the Tree of Life, and Jewish ideas of emanation and divine presence. It strives to convey that creation is ongoing, that each person carries a spark of divine creativity, and that we can begin to see the world more clearly through intuition and experience.

The Eilat Tarot is a response to the question: Can the ancient symbols of one tradition illuminate the mystical insights of another without either losing its integrity? This deck offers one answer.

The Creation of the Deck and Guidebook

The deck itself emerged rapidly. I completed it in less than two weeks. However, what began as a “little white book” quickly grew into a very large white book, one that would take years to complete. Writing about the deck became an almost all-consuming project, fueled by a sense of urgency and a feeling I hadn’t felt in years: joy.

Tarot had become my prayer, a Jewish prayer, with Hebrew letters whispering back.

This book explores how I believe the 78 tarot cards align with the spiritual architecture of the Sefer Yetzirah. Alongside that structure, I offer reflections on Pamela Colman Smith’s images and how they continue to reveal new meanings over time.

I hope this book becomes your companion. Write in it, scribble in the margins, question what no longer speaks to you, and expand on what does. That kind of engagement has shaped my own path. For over forty years, I’ve been annotating my copy of Norma Cowie’s Exploring the Patterns of the Tarot, a copy so well-loved its spine is long gone. It remains one of my most valued companions, alongside a newer copy of Aryeh Kaplan’s Sefer Yetzirah, purchased in the U.S. because I had to leave my original behind in Eilat. These texts continue to challenge and deepen my understanding. I hope this guide offers something like that for you, a place to begin, return to, and grow with.

Tarot doesn’t reveal its wisdom all at once. Its meaning unfolds over time.

_____

Footnotes:

1. Pronounced ay-LAHT
2. The Book of Formation. In modern Hebrew it is pronounced SEH-fehr Yet-tzee-RAH. (Ashkenazim may say SEY-fer Ye-tsi-RAH.)
3. Sefirot (סְפִירוֹת, s’fee-ROTE) is the plural form of a Hebrew word meaning “spheres,” “enumerations,” or “emanations,” used in Kabbalistic thought to describe the ten divine attributes or stages through which the Divine Will manifests. The singular form is Sefirah (סְפִירָה, s’FEE-rah).
4. The Golden Dawn was a late 19th-century occult society that experimented with integrating tarot, astrology, and Sefer Yetzirah. Although their original tarot deck has been lost, later creations by its members (The Thoth Tarot by Aleister Crowley and the Rider-Waite-Smith deck by A. E. Waite and Pamela Colman Smith) became highly influential.
5. Rachel Pollack based the deck on the Sefer Raziel, perhaps aligning her work more with the mystical traditions of Hekhalot and Merkavah literature than with later Kabbalah.
6. The weekly Torah portion read in synagogue services. Pronounced pah-rah-SHAH in Modern Hebrew; Ashkenazi pronunciation is often shortened to par-sha. Plural: Parashot (פָּרָשׁוֹת), pronounced pah-rah-SHOHT; Ashkenazi plural: Parshiyos.
7. Kaplan’s commentary on section 1:4, Sefer Yetzirah: The Book of Creation. Translated and commented by Aryeh Kaplan, Weiser Books, 1997
8. Freemasons later combined Christian Kabbalah with Hermetic philosophy. This was further elaborated by the Rosicrucians and the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, who developed a form of Kabbalah oriented toward ritual magic, incorporating alchemy, tarot, astrology, and ceremonial rites. In these currents, Kabbalah was reinterpreted independently of its traditional Torah-based framework.
9. While I was finishing this guidebook, Stav Appel published Torah in Tarot, an enhanced reproduction of a medieval French deck, accompanied by a fascinating companion text in which he argues convincingly that the Jean Noblet Tarot is a cipher safeguarding Jewish tradition within the already existing Italian playing cards, during a time when the Church sought to erase Jewish heritage and learning among recently converted Christians. Even the word ‘tarot’ itself may derive from a play on the word ‘Torah.’ His book is exciting and revelatory for anyone who has looked for Torah in the tarot!
10. Expressed more frankly, I wanted a Jewish tarot deck.
11. Aliyah (עֲלִיָּה, ah-lee-YAH) A Hebrew word meaning “ascent.” In a synagogue, it refers to the honor of being called up to recite blessings over the Torah. It also denotes the act of going up to the Land of Israel, a term used since ancient times for pilgrimage to Jerusalem or returning from exile. In modern usage, it also refers to Jewish immigration to Israel. Plural: aliyot (עֲלִיּוֹת, ah-lee-YOHT); Ashkenazi pronunciation: uh-LEE-uh, plural aliyos.
12. A friend and study partner.
13. From Arlan Wareham’s autobiography: “Our Adventist family never went to movie theaters, but sometimes suitable family films were shown on Saturday nights in Burden Hall, the same college lecture hall where we also went to church. Most of these, of course, I don’t remember at all, but one of them made a big impression on me: Pollyanna. I remember loving her positive attitude and attempts to help everyone see the bright side of things. I also remember feeling disappointed in her when her optimism seemed to fail her after she fell, seriously injuring her leg and causing her to be paralyzed from the waist down. Somehow, I grasped the importance of maintaining a positive outlook on everything, and it has served me well throughout my life.”

The Large White Book

I’ve been writing, rewriting, deleting, rearranging, and generally wrestling with Part One of my book for months. Part Two, the section where I will actually discuss each individual card of my deck, remains mostly theoretical. I’ve written about only three of the seventy-eight cards! The Fool is not the only one on a long journey.

To nudge myself forward, I asked the UPS store to print a hard copy of the book. I thought seeing it would be motivational. I was not prepared for the size of it!

They handed me a brick.

A 254-page brick.

I hadn't realized how much material I’d dumped into my Google document. Three-quarters of it is still a chaotic constellation of notes, half-formed ideas, and passages muttering to each other in the margins.

Holding that heavy stack of paper did make the project feel more real... solid, so to speak.

But then, instead of pressing forward with Part Two, I made the mistake of reading Chapter One!

Within one paragraph, I was thinking, "That needs work."
By the end of the page: ״Oh no, all that needs to be fixed!"
By the end of the chapter, "How could I have written something that bad?"

So now I have a dilemma: which should I do first? I can't bear to leave the six chapters of Part One in such a state, but if I don't move on to Part Two, the project will never be finished. And of course, once Part Two is written, there will undoubtedly more reasons to revise Part One. Again.

So maybe the wisest choice is to a deep breath, accept that writing is a messy business, and keep moving forward.

On the other hand... maybe the book feels poorly written because I’m used to writing for my blog and keeping an audience in mind. I may post those initial chapters to my blog. Seeing them in a more public light may show me how to improve them.

Speed Reading

I woke up this morning expecting to call in sick, but felt a little better and proceeded to get ready for work. But my throat was a little scratchy and I was slightly stuffed up, so I engaged in a little fantasy. What could I do with my day instead of work?

I didn’t have time for a long tarot reading, so I asked three quick questions and pulled one card for each.

Option 1. Go to work: Nine of Coins

The Nine of Coins shows a woman in a secure, walled garden surrounded by wealth. That’s me at the bank: literally surrounded by money, but also contained, safe, and earning the paycheck that’s slowly rebuilding my sense of financial stability.

There were the familiar roles, coworkers to interact with, and the challenge of learning a job that relies on my weakest traits.

The Nine of Coins can also indicate isolation. Going in today did mean continuing to push aside the personal matters that I really do need to reflect on, pretending everything is fine while growing just a touch more cynical.

Option 2. Reflect on my social life and do some tarot readings about it: Knight of Cups

I usually see this figure as a someone wandering aimlessly and holding a cup of daydreams, but he’s a knight and he might be holding a divination cup (like Josef's). He can indicate someone actively seeking emotional clarity, meaning, and connection.

This made him a perfect card for a day of reflecting on synagogue, friendship, relationships, and the trajectory of my life in the States... or back home. It could have been a good time to explore hope and direction.

But the Knight of Cups can chase ideals instead of grounding them. I might have spent the whole day wandering through feelings... or, more realistically, gotten pulled into binge watching the show I’m currently obsessed with.

Option 3. Work on my large white book: Queen of Wands

The Queen of Wands is a woman of focused fire, and she shows exactly what would have happened if I had spent the day on my LWB! I would have gotten a good amount of work done. Even one fully fleshed out section would feel amazing, The accomplishment would strengthen my confidence, my voice, and my sense of identity.

The downside was obvious: no payc for the day, and no attention to the personal issues I've kept postponing. And if I had started to feel sick later in the day, I would have been unlikely to rest; I would have just pushed through, riding the Queen of Wands’ momentum instead of going to bed.

(Realistic ETA for completing the book: 78 cards × one week for a draft × one week for revisions = about three and a half years.)

I chosen option one because momentum was already pulling me in that direction. And it was a good thing, too! Three other people were out-- two of them unexpectedly. I'm tired, but not worn out or feeling under the weather.

The Deck I’ve Been Waiting For All My Life!

Today, I’m expecting to receive a deck that I'm incredibly excited about: Stav Appel’s Torah in Tarot, a polished reproduction of the Jean Noblet Tarot, a medieval French tarot deck originally published in Paris around 1650.

In his book, Appel convincingly argues that this deck was a deliberate attempt to preserve and disguise Jewish tradition: Hebrew letters, biblical stories, and religious practices woven into the structure of existing Italian playing cards. At the time of its fist publication, the Church was actively trying to erase Jewish heritage among recently converted Christians. Some French crypto-Jews may have pretended to play trifoni as a cover for learning, just as Jews once pretended to gamble with dreidls as a cover for learning Torah.

That may sound far-fetched. One YouTube reviewer did a casual flip-through and dismissed the idea as fantasy. But as someone familiar with tarot imagery, I know the difference between projecting ideas into card images and recognizing what’s already there. And once you see it, it’s hard to unsee!

I used to turn up my nose at Marseille style decks because I found the art crude and unappealing. That was until Appel pointed out that the odd wheels in The Chariot are actually Torah scroll handles and that the tools on The Magician’s table are elements of a medieval mohel's kit. Even the name “tarot,” whose etymology has long puzzled scholars, may be a pun on “Torah.”

Before you roll your eyes at another un-scholarly theory about tarot’s origins, take a moment to look at the cards online. The Fool is clearly shaped like the Hebrew letter tav. The ayin is right there for all to see in La Maison Dieu (The Tower), as are the tablets of the Ten Commandments. The marks on The Magician’s dice point to the eighth day when circumcision is performed. The rays of sunlight in La Maison Dieu point to the date, Tisha b’Av. And most striking of all-- how could I have missed it-- the mikveh right there on The Judgment card! There are too many coincidences to dismiss as mere coincidence.

During the Inquisition, Jews who converted under duress were watched carefully to ensure they were not practicing Judaism. Hebrew texts and rituals were banned under threat of torture and execution. And yet, Jews tried to remember our heritage. 700 years later, some families wonder why, on Friday nights, they turn the picture of Jesus to the wall before lighting two candles. Many strange customs whose roots point back to hidden Jewish identities have been documented.

The idea that crypto-Jews in France may have used tarot to preserve and transmit tradition isn’t wild speculation. It fits into a broader pattern of cultural camouflage, such as secret mezuzot carved into door frames.

Why has no one else noticed the Torah in tarot before Stav Appel? Probably because the history of tarot is surfeit with exotic theories of its origins in ancient Egypt or in Kabbalah, making it sensible to dismiss tarot altogether. Even I used to roll my eyes at the notion that tarot is Kabbalah. I didn't believe that Judaism is in the tarot, but I was trying to put it there. (Keep an eye out: my deck and book will be coming out soon.)

Thanks to Torah in Tarot, I now know how medieval French Jews attempted to preserve our culture in the cards and I have a guidebook to help me recognize the symbols and stories they chose to preserve. It adds depth to my already existing obsession with tarot.

Once the package lands on my doorstep later today, I’ll dive in. For now, I just wanted to share the anticipation.

Revisiting MBTI & the Tarot Court Cards: A Reflection and Revision (2019 & 2025)

Six years ago, I attempted to map the 16 Myers-Briggs Type Indicators (MBTI) to the 16 Tarot court cards using a symbolic wheel and a mixture of structure, intuition, and trial-and-error. At the time, I included David Kiersey’s temperament groupings in my calculations and tried to distribute the four pairs of traits evenly among the Tarot ranks (Page, Knight, Queen, King) and suits (Pentacles, Swords, Cups, Wands).

I’ve returned to this project with a simpler approach. While I still believe that Tarot and MBTI are not systems meant for one-to-one correspondence, I’ve found surprising results in aligning them through trait-to-symbol associations.

This post compares the Kiersey-MBTI version from 2019 with an MBTI-centered version, both of which explore how these two systems may echo each other.

The 2019 Version (Kiersey Modification of MBTI):

I assigned the suits to the MBTI cognitive functions:

Sensing (S) → Pentacles
iNtuiting (N) → Wands
Thinking (T) → Swords
Feeling (F) → Cups

The Attitudes (E/I) and Lifestyles (J/P) could fall into any rank, but I made sure each MBTI temperament group (SJ, NJ, SP, NP) and each Kiersey group (NF and NT) included one card of each rank. (Follow this link to see how that looked.)

The 2025 Version (MBTI-Centered Mapping of the Tarot Court Cards):

I align the four MBTI pairs with all the characteristics of the court cards:

Extraversion (E) → Knight / Introversion (I) → Queen
Judging (J) → King / Perceiving (P) → Page
Sensing (S) → Pentacles / iNtuiting (N) → Wands
Thinking (T) → Swords / Feeling (F) → Cups

Each personality type is assigned one Tarot court card, matching both suit and rank constraints. Here's how they line up:

SJs – Grounded, Loyal, Responsible
ESFJ ... King of Cups - Nurturing, emotionally steady leader
ISFJ ... Queen of Pentacles - Devoted, grounded caretaker <-- me
ESTJ ... King of Pentacles - Practical and authoritative
ISTJ ... Queen of Swords - Cool-headed, dutiful, principled

NJs – Visionary, Intuitive
ENFJ ... King of Wands - Bold, motivational, future-focused
INFJ ... Queen of Cups - Gentle, empathic, inwardly deep
ENTJ ... King of Swords - Commanding strategist with clear logic
INTJ ... Queen of Wands - Confident, inwardly fiery, visionary

SPs – Observant, Action-Oriented
ESFP ... Knight of Cups - Emotionally expressive, spontaneous
ISFP ... Page of Cups - Gentle, artistic, emotionally sensitive
ESTP ... Page of Pentacles - Practical, curious, hands-on learner
ISTP ... Page of Swords - Cool, alert, quick-thinking

NPs – Inventive, Idealistic
ENFP ... Knight of Wands - Energetic, expressive, visionary
INFP ... Page of Wands - Dreamy, imaginative, hopeful
ENTP ... Knight of Swords - Fast, sharp, idea-driven
INTP ... Knight of Pentacles - Steady, cerebral, dedicated

The earlier system was an ambitious attempt to align the tarot court with both MBTI and Kiersey’s modifications. The results were inconsistent. Many court cards felt misaligned with the emotional tone or functional energy of their paired type.

In contrast, the current system is cleaner, more internally consistent, and symbolically richer. It’s based directly on MBTI’s four dichotomies and maps onto the Tarot suits and ranks surprisingly well. Neither version is “correct,” of course. But this newer approach feels more like a conversation between systems, rather than a forced equivalency.

If you’ve worked with Tarot or MBTI, or both, I’d love to hear what resonated for you. What court card do you see in yourself?

I Know It When I See It

Jonathan Tobin's recent article in JNS, Biased media fuels American Jewish opposition to Israel, argues that many American Jews believe Israel is committing genocide because they’ve been shaped by a relentlessly biased media and have little connection to Jewish identity or Israel itself.

This article blames a biased media. That misses something deeper, something I’ve noticed for decades in parts of the American Jewish Left. I’ve never quite been able to define it, but like that famous judge, I know it when I see it.

Every American Jew has met them: the “Berkeley Jews.” The ones manning the PLO booth on University Avenue. It’s a kind of sickness, perhaps a lingering infection from the 1920s and ’30s, when it was fashionable to be espouse radical political ideas. (It still is in some circles.)

I saw it again just months ago at Congregation Beth Israel in Austin. Men in Torah study speaking as if parroting propaganda made them intellectually brilliant and morally superior, when in fact they were repeating a blood libel.

And then there was the woman straight out of Orwell: blindly devoted to the party line. She knows the slogans better than she knows the history of Israel. When she says, “I believe the State of Israel has a right to exist,” she hopes you won’t notice that everything after “but” cancels out the first half of her sentence, and by extension, the right of any Jew, even herself, to breathe free air anywhere.

What drives this? A desire to set themselves apart from those “other Jews,” the supposedly evil or unenlightened ones? Some sociological phenomenon of the diaspora? A psychological one? I don’t know.

Some call them self-hating Jews. I think that gives them too much credit. They’re not self-hating. They’re self-absorbed! They love their own image so much that they’ve lost the ability to see reality, or to care for other human beings, Jewish or otherwise.

The Scapegoat Lives!

When we say “scapegoat” in English, we are referring to someone who is punished for our misdeeds. But that isn’t how the Torah describes the sa'ir l'Azazel.

In Leviticus 16, the High Priest places the sins of the people onto a goat chosen “for Azazel,” ties a crimson thread onto its horn, and sends it alive into the wilderness. It is not sacrificed. It is not punished instead of us. The goat simply carries our sins away from us, back toward Sinai, into the desert, back to the place where we spent 40 years in the presence of God.

Our modern figure of speech misses the point: the biblical goat is not destroyed but released. Our sins are not wiped away; God graces us with a moment in which we are released from our sins.

The Talmud relates that when God forgave the people each Yom Kippur, the crimson thread turned white, fulfilling Isaiah’s promise: “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow” (Isa. 1:18).

Even without the Temple, Yom Kippur still gives us this gift. For part of this day, we are freed of our sins long enough to recognize them. On this day, we feel the pull toward holiness. Just as each passing hour strengthens our resolve to continue the fast, this day loosens the habits that bind us to our sins.

But we are human and we will sin again, perhaps the very moment the fast ends. (If I am any indication, we may even struggle to keep our thoughts pure during the day itself.)

Yom Kippur gives us a moment when God sees us as pure, and we feel the weight of sin lifted from us. It is a moment to taste what it feels like to live without guilt. We can see more clearly what our sins are and resolve to live differently in the year ahead. Unlike the scapegoat, we can't return to the Wilderness of Sinai, but we can strive to live well where we are, and seek, once more, to draw close to God.

How Medieval Rabbits Hopped into My Dining Room

When the first Passover seder falls on a Saturday night, Jewish tradition weaves together the rituals of leaving Shabbat and entering the festival. On that evening, there is a special sequence of blessings, remembered through the acronym, YaKNeHaZ:

• Yayin – blessing over the wine
• Kiddush – sanctifying the day over wine
• Ner – lighting the candle
• Havdalah – blessing marking the end of Shabbat
• Zman – reciting Shehecheyanu, the blessing for special occasions

Together these form the sequence YaKNeHaZ.

For Jews in medieval Ashkenaz, the sound of the acronym recalled the German phrase “jag den Has,” meaning “hunt the hare.” This coincidence sparked whimsical marginal illustrations in medieval haggadot, where hunters and rabbits became playful stand-ins for the liturgical order.

I’ve always been fascinated by this quirky intersection of language, ritual, and art. And when I started looking for artwork for my new home, I knew I didn’t want something that simply said, “Yes, I took Art History 101,” which, in fact, I didn't.

So with the help of AI, I created a series of illuminated-style images inspired by the hare-hunt tradition. My plan is to print, mat, and frame them as a cycle for my dining room wall. Each image reflects both the pun and the unfolding of seder night:

• The Hunt - a medieval pun with hunter, dog, and hares.
• Havdalah Amidst Rabbits - a candle raised, a cup of wine, and rabbit companions.
• Reading the Haggadah - man and rabbits together, remembering the exodus from Egypt.
• The Festive Meal - seder plate, matzah, and wine shared under a  full moon and starry sky.
• Shofar and Celebration - the hunt transformed into sounding the horn in hope of Elijah’s arrival.

For me, this project feels like reclaiming a bit of Jewish visual history, the lighter, more playful side of medieval manuscript art, and bringing it into a contemporary Jewish home.

Soon, when I hang them right to left (like Hebrew text) or perhaps top to bottom, they’ll read as a miniature illuminated Haggadah cycle. My dining room wall will tell not just the story of ritual order, but also the story of how Jews across time have used humor, puns, and imagination to enrich tradition.

Because ritual, like art, has always thrived when it leaves space for playfulness and laughter.

Poll time again! Help me design the box!

Here’s a first look at the box design for the Eilat Tarot!

I’ve created two mock-ups. One is in black-and-white to match the cards and companion book. The other is in color, inspired by a box of Chanukah candles-but with ten candles to represent the ten sefirot.

The deck itself will be entirely black and white. But I’m still torn about the box! Should it match the cards or stand out like the festival of lights? I would love your thoughts? Black-and-white or colorful? 

And a bonus view of the back of the box!

My favorite writing implement? The eraser!

I just deleted 10 pages of my guidebook and replaced it with a clearer introduction. Real progress!

If you're curious, the footnote says: "Throughout this guidebook, I’ve italicized Hebrew titles and terms such as Sefer Yetzirah and sefirot. Quotations from authors such as Aryeh Kaplan retain their original formatting."

Barbie: The Movie

Just watched Barbie, and I loved it!

The anti-woke outrage? Totally overblown. This is a fun, clever movie… about dolls. It takes the unrealistic world of Barbie and spins it into something self-aware, entertaining, and surprisingly moving.

One thing the movie nailed: as kids, we never knew what to do with Ken. He really was just Barbie’s accessory—and the film captured that perfectly. Honestly, I found myself cheering for the Kens. They weren’t portrayed as villains or victims, just as dolls waking up to the fact that they had no defined identity of their own.

Helen Mirren’s narration is perfect. Of course. The human mother and daughter added some warmth and grounding to the story—though Gloria’s big speech went on a bit too long for my taste. It was really touching when Gloria's daughter began singing along to the Indigo Girls with her mom. And I really enjoyed Barbie’s quiet, unexpected conversations with the ghost of Ruth Handler, the woman who created her.

Also amusing: the human father/husband's cameo. A nice parallel to Ken’s role in Barbie’s world, and a funny little nod to how secondary male characters can be in stories addressed to women.

I was never at all attached to my own Barbie doll, but I did love rebuilding her pink townhouse every time we moved. And I had a great time sewing clothes for her by hand—since the glue in the Barbie Sewing Machine never worked.

Also: when is Mattel releasing Barbie’s Enormous Gem Necklace? Asking for a friend.

What about you? What are your Barbie memories? Did you love her, ignore her, cut her hair off? Feel free to share your stories in the comments—I’d love to hear them.

Poll Time! Help Me Choose a Title for My Tarot Guidebook

Vote! Select a letter below to help me choose a title for my LWB, "little white book." 📖

I’m still deep in the writing process, maybe halfway there, but I’d love your help choosing a title. It's for a guidebook to my Eilat Tarot, a Jewish deck that draws on the Sefer Yetzirah, the Hebrew calendar, the Land of Israel, and the symbolism of numbers and letters.

Which title do you like best? Feel free to vote for more than one, or suggest your own twist!

A. The Eilat Tarot: Little White Book
B. Eilat Tarot: A Tarot of Sunlight, Stone, and Water
C. The Eilat Tarot: Numbers, Letters, and the Land

D. The World Was Created With Letters: A Jewish Tarot Companion
E. Path of the Desert Letters: A Mystical Guide of Desert, Voice, and Vision
F. Letters of Light: A Kabbalistic Tarot Guide

G. Voice in the High Places: The World Was Created With Breath and Speech
H. The Tarot of Returning: A Tarot Guide Through Soul, World, and Time

I. The Tarot of Formation
J. Letters of Formation: The Tarot of Creation According to the Sefer Yetzirah
K. Formed in Silence: A Tarot Guide Through Soul, World, and Time

Thanks for helping me shape this journey! Your feedback means a lot. 💙

I’ll post updates as the project continues!

Contemplative Tarot: What to Do with Darkness

Shadow, Self, and Soul:

What are these dark felings? The Tower suggests that something in my foundational beliefs is shifting. Maybe I’m being asked to believe that conflict doesn’t mean everything is ruined, that even real upheaval can lead to growth.

I wonder. What are these dark feelings revealing? Can I still feel my longing for joy, for connection, for peace? That longing is part of me and it points me back to the vision I hold of emotional harmony and belonging (Ten of Cups).

My soul reminds me that emotions aren’t obstacles. They’re signals guiding me toward what matters. So I choose to keep going faithfully (Knight of Cups). I let my heart stay open and I let my soul guide me, even through uncertain waters.

Make Your Blessings Count

Blessed is he who not only counts his blessings, but makes his blessings count.
- a refrigerator magnet
I’ve been feeling grateful lately—but also a little uneasy about whether I’m doing enough with the good I’ve been given. I’m thoroughly enjoying many aspects of life in the U.S.—the comfort, the ease, the many luxuries—because each one feels like an enormous blessing. Still, I worry that I’m not showing enough gratitude. I’m not putting enough heart into my job training, not taking enough walks to enjoy the weather and scenery, and not making any real effort to meet people or make friends.

So I did a reading with The Ocean Tarot, a mermaid-themed deck that reminds me of Eilat—the jumping-off point for my journey back to the US.

The question I asked was, "How can I rise up and align myself with the blessings I am receiving?"

Fives showed up frequently in this reading. That’s the sefirah גְּבוּרָה (Gevurah), Strength. These challenges—emotional, social, even spiritual—may be necessary to help me grow. Fives often represent spiritual transition. (Across various traditions, fives are generally understood as points of instability, challenge, or disruption that invite growth.)

CARD 1 – The Blessings Present
What blessings or gifts are currently flowing into my life? (It feels like there are so many blessings, I could have pulled a dozen cards.)

Page of Pearls (Cups)
This is the kid who is appreciative and open-hearted toward whatever or whomever he encounters. In this deck, the Page—a merman—is admiring a glowing pearl. The blessings of my new life feel precious, hard-won, and still dazzling. Maybe the real blessing is that my heart can feel wonder and grace. There are seahorses all around him—symbols of patience, fatherhood, and gentleness. The seahorses remind me to approach life gently.

In my Eilat Tarot, this card is called: Servant of Grace

CARD 2 – What Holds Me Back
What pattern, attitude, or distraction keeps me from aligning with these blessings?

Four of Pearls (Cups)
This card is such a contrast to the last one. It represents someone who isn’t paying attention to the blessings around him—or the additional divine gifts being offered. Although I’m aware of all the blessings I’m receiving, I reflexively retreat from opportunities. The fourth pearl, descending with rays of light from the ocean’s surface, evokes a spiritual prompting to stay awake and grateful.

In my Eilat Tarot, this card is called: The Closed Heart

CARD 3 – Embodying Heart and Presence
How can I bring more heart into my work and daily actions?

Five of Pearls (Cups)
This is someone who needs to see not just his losses and what he still has, but needs to "cross the bridge to the castle of dreams," i.e. aspire to the next great goal he can reach. He should not just survive hardship, but dare to hope again. In this deck, there are three broken eggs and two live jellyfish, suggesting sensitivity and vulnerability. I'm being invited to move through emotion into a new purpose. The adult jellyfish in the background suggest emotional maturity, reminding me I can move forward even while remaining sensitive. Bringing heart into daily actions means not fearing emotional messiness, but using it to deepen compassion and connection.

In my Eilat Tarot, this card is called: Crossing the Waters
(I might rename it The Mourner's Path)

CARD 4 – Reconnecting with the World
What will help me engage with nature and people with more joy and aliveness?

Two of Treasure (Pentacles)
Usually this card means being undecided about which path to commit to—but in this deck, the figure resembles The World card. It’s a portrait of joyful receiving rather than striving. It suggests saying “yes” more often, and being a little less guarded.

In my Eilat Tarot, this card is called: The Tension of Two Worlds
(I might rename it The Dancer Between Two Worlds)

CARD 5 – The Path of Rising
What does it look like to rise up and live in alignment with the life I’ve been given?

Five of Spears (Swords)
This is a surprising card in this position. It’s about the sore winner—someone who clings to resentment or conflict. But in The Medieval Cat Tarot, it can also indicate the support of true friends, releasing shame, internal healing, or making amends. Maybe here, it points toward independence—not desperately seeking love or fearing scarcity. It may be a call to walk forward unburdened by the past, to release not just people but also narratives tied to old pain. Once again, I’m reminded of what my father tried to teach me for over forty years—a lesson that’s become something of a personal motto, even if it’s not quite 100% true: “No one is your friend, and money’s the only thing that matters.”

In my Eilat Tarot, this card is called: The Severed Bond
(I might rename it Beyond the Battle)

This reading reminds me: it’s not enough to count my blessings—I must carry them forward, with presence and purpose.

A Tarot Deck of Eilat

After years of study, dreaming, and designing, much of them in the hills and along the shores of Eilat, I’ve finally begun to shape my tarot deck into something real. I call it Candles of Shekhinah, and it brings together decades of reading, years of writing, and a deep desire to integrate Jewish mysticism with the intuitive world of tarot.

The desert landscape shaped how I approached the cards in ways I still can’t fully explain. The red hills of Edom at sunrise, the silence of the southern mountains, and the turquoise glow of the Gulf of Aqaba left an imprint on my imagination. They became part of how I now think about the elements, the sefirot, and the soul’s journey.

Many people helped guide me along the way. I spent my first seven years reading tarot with David Palladini's Aquarian Tarot and no reference books—just perseverance and a small spark of intuition. Eventually, my determination led me to guides I remain deeply grateful to:

• Norma Cowie, whose Exploring the Patterns of the Tarot became my foundational text and still lives in a binder packed with notes and annotations. (1987)
• Robin Wood, whose warm and accessible deck supported me through my early years of reading. (1992)
• Isabel Radow Kliegman, whose Tarot and the Tree of Life first gave me the idea to pair the pip cards with the sefirot, and whose Four Worlds framework for the court cards resonated deeply. (1997)
• Donald Tyson, whose Portable Magic: Tarot Is the Only Tool You Need persuaded me to adopt the Golden Dawn structure—with thoughtful revisions. His reordered planetary assignments gave the Major Arcana a more elegant internal logic. (2016)
• Aryeh Kaplan, whose translation of the Sefer Yetzirah gave me the symbolic vocabulary that now forms the backbone of the Majors, including elemental, planetary, and zodiacal attributions, as well as potent one-word letter meditations like Light, Speech, and Peace. (2018)

A Glimpse Into the Structure of My Deck

Major Arcana: Each card follows the Golden Dawn’s path system on the Tree of Life. Instead of using traditional letter-name meanings (e.g., “ox,” “camel”), I chose the symbolic functions drawn from the Sefer Yetzirah. These attributes, such as Light, Sleep, and Dominance, give each card a conceptual focus. The Letter for each path appears in Hebrew, Paleo-Hebrew, and Ugaritic script, offering both mystical resonance and historical texture.

Sefirot: To clarify meaning and avoid repetition, I’ve retitled the sefirot. Keter becomes Divine Will, Chesed becomes Mercy, Tiferet becomes Beauty, Hod becomes Gratitude, and Malchut becomes Dwelling—a nod to the Shekhinah. Each name is chosen to reflect both spiritual and emotional resonance.

Court Cards: These are people, not abstractions. While I preserved Golden Dawn elemental pairings (e.g., Water of Fire), I chose evocative archetypal titles such as Watcher of the Grove, Rider of the Wind, Keeper of the Field, and Master of Compassion. Following Kliegman’s model, I assigned the Four Worlds of Kabbalah as follows: Pages receive the potential of Atzilut (Emanation), Knights advance the generative force of Beriah (Creation), Queens shape and cultivate in the matrix of Yetzirah (Formation), and Kings bring intentions into concrete expression in Asiyah (Action)

Letters of God’s Name: To reflect the divine presence while honoring sacred boundaries, I include the letters of the Tetragrammaton in Paleo-Hebrew on the court cards to suggest their spiritual depth without reproducing God's name in standard Hebrew script.

Minor Arcana: The pip cards are assigned to the sefirot 1 through 10, with each card bearing a Hebrew subtitle derived from the Sefer Yetzirah. Card titles emerge from a synthesis of Pamela Colman Smith’s imagery, elemental correspondence, and number symbolism drawn from Kabbalah, Pythagorean thought, and the Marseilles tradition.

Decans and the Hebrew Calendar: The decan system helped me assign Hebrew months to the pip cards, aligning each group of three cards with one of the Twelve Tribes of Israel. While drawn from astrological tradition, these correspondences also allowed me to pair the Minor Arcana with Jewish holidays, seasonal rhythms, and historical memory.

There’s much more to do—titles to refine, meditations to write, and a guidebook to shape—but the bones of the deck are here. The work I began in Eilat, the spiritual clarity I glimpsed there, and the texts, teachers, and friends that guided me all live on in this evolving creation.

Stay tuned. More to come!

Reading at Daybreak: A Grounded Path Forward

I seldom use The Forty Servants deck for readings, but this morning I did, while enjoying the morning sun and pleasant air outside my new home. The reading was surprisingly rich and spoke directly to my current transition of settling into life in a new location.

West / Earth “How can I establish a meaningful livelihood?” 
THE IDEA
I already have the seed of my future; my main idea for employment is viable and must be pursued urgently.
Earth is about tangible action and results. The Idea is a call to implementation. This matches my question about work. This card encourages me to trust my idea and take practical steps to achieve it.
I have to start calling the right businesses and ask my friend for her contacts in that industry.

North / Fire “How can I kindle inspiration and passion?” 
THE MESSENGER
There are messages that I am failing to see or hear. Fire brings enthusiasm and divine spark. This card suggests that sources of inspiration aren’t lacking; I just need to pay attention. Something wants to ignite my passion and connect me to others.(In one of the vivid dreams I've had recently, a very dark-skinned black woman in a yellow sun dress came to our door and said to me saucily, “We need to get you a bed-- and a job!!”) 

East / Air “How can I cultivate communication, relationships, and growth?”
THE LOVERS
Relationships are at the heart of a person's intellectual and emotional life. This card tells me to make meaningful choices. It encourages me to choose connection, not isolation. The Lovers also suggests I maintain integrity in how I speak and whom I partner with.

South / Water “How can I nourish my emotional and spiritual life?”
THE FATHER
Seek someone who can provide good counsel, wisdom, and insight--someone who can prepare me to deal appropriately with hardship. Water purifies and clarifies. The Father brings boundaries, strength, experience, and wise guidance.

Center “What hidden needs or overlooked aspects require attention?”
THE DEPLETED 
I am still carrying weight from the past that drains my energy. This card means rest, release, and renewal. While the other four cards point toward growth and forward motion, this one cautions that I must first make space for that growth. The Idea can’t bloom and The Lovers can’t unite if I am exhausted or mentally scattered.

Summary and Reflection: It will be possible to step into the kind of life I came here to create, if I stay grounded and attend to reality diligently. The Idea and The Lovers speak of a bold beginning and aligned relationships. The Messenger and The Father suggest that help is available if I listen closely and accept it. The Depleted card serves as a gentle warning that I can’t build a new life with old habits. I must rest and release.