Fairy Lights-Card Pairs: The Strength and xxx

Hemera

The Fairy and the Polar Bear are dueling on the cliff but they have their back on the merpeople of the Five of Pentacles. The merpeople do not seem to notice the Bear or care about him either even though he looks dangerous. The merpeople are busy playing with their gems and golden dishes and other valuable treasures. The merpeople are blue skinned and seem cold bloodied, half reptiles while the Bear is clearly fuming and hot.

I got this combination recently in a reading about a situation at someone´s work. The person is struggling to cope with his work load while his co-workers seem to be amazingly unaware of what is going on.
 

Aerin

It's almost as if the fairy is trying to ride the polar bear into the water, and the bear can tell it isn't a good idea. I don't like that fairy. The bear reminds me of a 'dancing bear' and seems very sad and despairing http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tame_bear - my grandmother had an old painting of one and there was a song too http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_Smith_and_the_Amazing_Dancing_Bear .

Maybe the merpeople are dangerous when their territory is invaded and their treasure might be threatened. There's one merperson looking further than the end of his own nose/jewellery, he's climbing out but it doesn't look like he'll be much use on dry land.

ps In a way I think that these cards are the negative side of the meaning. They are both about having power and abusing that power, either by inaction (merpeople not helping anyone with their treasure) or by action (fairy misusing the polar bear).
 

thirdlibra

I also really am not a fan of this iteration of Strength. I've read about this one type of mischievious fairie who'll jump on someone's back and make them run to their death. That's who I see this little guy as. I've often read the merman in the 5 of Pents as that overly adventerous guy, who is always getting himself into trouble by doing something out of his depth, but who also always seems to come out of it unharmed and with a fabulous story to tell for it. I like to read this pair as him overcoming the odds by coming out of his natural area - water - to overcome the evil little faerie and rescue the poor bear. Then he goes back to the estuary-party all out of breathe like GUYS GUESS WHAT I JUST DID and they are too drunk and self-centered to do much more than laugh at him getting himself into yet another ridiculous scenario. It makes for a happier pairing to see them that way, for me.
 

Bookwight

Okay, that bear draws my eye. At first I thought the figure on its shoulders was being cruel, poking the bear with a stick or something — but what if he isn’t being cruel? What if that bear isn’t bellowing in pain, but is just showing off?

I confess, I took a magnifying glass to this card, and it turns out the bear is wearing a headstall made of (I think) gold. Chains? And that’s not a stick, that’s a rein (silly me). Now, the bear could snap that fine rein laughably easily, I bet. And the rein is taut, as if the rider can barely control it — yet he doesn’t look worried to me. (Is it a he? Strength is traditionally female, and the figure’s body looks pretty feminine, but the face strikes me as male and I just can’t call it “she” somehow.) I think he’s smiling. Perhaps that bear is rearing and roaring for the sheer joy of it, and the figure who rides it shares its joy. Perhaps they have a partnership. Perhaps this is Strength made manifest: the powerful animal-nature in accord with the human-nature.

The figures in the Five of Pentacles are so different from what I’m used to. Merpeople, crowned in gold and floating amongst glittering treasure. Is the treasure sinking? Are they worried? Or have they just found it and are pleased as they raise it to the surface? One of the mermen seems to be trying to leave the water, but can he succeed? Can he live outside the water?

This could mean so many things, I love the layers of meaning. What use is gold in the sea, after all? Might it not just weight you down? And how important is all that treasure anyway? The Five of Pents is about poverty and hardship, and being left out in the cold either literally or figuratively; but perhaps it’s better to stop worrying so much. Let the treasure sink away, and crawl out of the depths of our despair.

Or it could be interpreted wholly differently. Water can symbolise life, purity, emotions, the subconscious… The gold in the sea might represent wealth in one of those areas? Perhaps it’s time to recognise the treasures we do have, and stop trying to crawl into the earthly realm in search of material treasure…

But are the bear-&-rider heading away from or towards those figures in the Five? Is the rider trying to turn the bear, and that’s why the rein’s so taut? And if they go to the Five, will they help them? Or have they just left? Perhaps they have won free of the concerns of the Five, and that’s why they’re so happy and so strong together.

Either way, I think this card suggests that inner strength will help you when poverty strikes, or when you lose faith. These cards complement each other in so many intriguing ways, I could babble on forever! But that’s enough.
 

Bookwight

……I posted mine without reading anyone else's first, and yep, they're different! I don't know if I'm trying too hard to fit that bear-&-rider into a positive meaning for Strength, or if I hit upon something. It definitely reveals I'm an optimist at heart, anyway. And as I've said before and will doubtless say again — ad tedium? }) — all of these interpretations could have validity, depending on the spread and the position and question and querent and reader……
 

Aeon.of.Horus

Hmmmm
5 Pentacles = Earth - Taurus in the 1st decan
XI - Strength = Fire - Leo

So this is just the 3rd set of cards I have looked at here and already I get the overall feeling that each one of these pairs are astronomically charged. Earth and Fire are friendly and passive. They help and complement one and other quite nicely which brings us over to how these cards should interact with one and other.

Card 1 - 5 Pentacles:- Here we see two Mer-people looking around in dismay at their scattered treasures in the shallow bay. This would symbolise, 'is it really worth worrying about'? The monetary worries of life in general are shallow and temporary. So where have these treasures come from, land or sea?
Later I will let you into this little secret too. But for now we shall move on the the Strength card.
Card 2 - XII Strength:- Now personally I like what Crowley did to the zodiacal aspects of the cards and in that respect this card is perfectly placed in it's line up, Leo. Now as we know Strength isn't about wrestling a bear with ones bare hands into submission but more to have power over something that is a willing recipient of your love,through respect and a mutual understanding of one and other. Empathy is a word I always see here in the Strength card and from empathy and compassion great strength can be achieved.
Here we see a Faerie riding this bear and as Bookwight mentioned her (and it is a her, if you look real close she is wearing a bask, hotpants and knee length boots. I never seen a heterosexual bloke wearing the same lol). And quite rightly the bear has bit & reigns of pure gold, that look like with a certain amount of tension this bear could break these chains and head off home to mama. But he doesn't, why?

Now let's put these two cards together and see their story.

These Mer-people who kept their life savings tucked away in a little cave (where we see the treasure trailing off from) that a band of naughty thieving Brownies tried to steal. Unbeknownst to said Brownies these Mer-people but they were very friendly with a Sidhe and her (usually friendly) bear. The Sidhe heard the Mer-people shouting "We've been robbed, STOP THIEFE!" So out she came to the rescue to help her friends, by striking the fear into these thieving Brownies and try to stop the robbery dead in it's tracks. Out she comes with her bear in full on ROAR! Much to the surprise of the Brownies and also to their terror, so they just dropped everything and legged it screaming as they go :thumbsup: .
So here we see only the aftermath! The bear in full roar and the Mer-people gutted about the fact that their worldly treasure stash has been compromised. The Brownies are still right now running in fear just out of the picture frame.


Well that is my take anyway.

Aeon