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I didn’t expect to be pondering this card for three days, but there’s a depth to this suit that I haven’t experienced before. Coins, Pentacles, so often described briskly as the suit of money and occupation is broadened by this deck into the scope of Creation, the Earth, and our vital relationship with it. This suit speaks to our center of gravity. No matter how far into the cloud of unknowing our seeking takes us, the Earth element always requires our return. The hero’s journey is not complete until it is brought back to earth. “Feet on the ground, down to earth, earthy beauty, earthy humor, Mahler’s ‘Song of The Earth,’ ‘Earth, Wind, and Fire.’” The Coin of the Ace, rather than presented as in traditional decks as a gift from above, now sits on a homely mound beneath a tree as part of the underlying great gift of the Earth. And instead of the traditional pentagram the alchemical symbol for creation (the diamond-shaped hole) is in the center of the coin, marked by arrows for the four directions and the four elements. The traditional pentagram is used sparsely in this deck. A rabbit is in the foreground; Place does not discuss it in his card description, but in “Pictures From the Heart” Sandra A. Thompson writes “In alchemy the hare is the guide to the interior of the Earth....” (Thompson, p. 288). The rabbit also appears in The Fool, where it “in archetypal psychology serves as a guide to the underworld (unconscious).... (p. 288). In the RW Queen of Pentacles, I believe the rabbit symbolizes fertility(?), but doesn’t seem to carry the same power as in the Alchemical Tarot. This connection between The Fool and the Ace of Coins, with its arrows pointing in four directions, both signifying great beginnings, was very compelling for me as an emphasis that our journey is both inward and out, as a profound reminder of what this is all about. I’m very taken by Place’s emphasis, a new experience for me. Eagerly awaiting your thoughts.
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