Ellis decK - Justice

Hemera

I was surprised by the black- and whiteness of this Justice when I first saw it. This is otherwise such a colourful deck so I was wondering why suddenly this black and whiteness in one card. It looked strange and I was not sure I´d learn to like it at all. Well, was I ever wrong. I have just had it twice in readings where it has absolutely hit the nail in the head.
This woman looks distant and maybe a bit cold like these Justice card ladies often do. Her eyes are closed. The companion book says she is a Queen in a distant land which is the midpoint of the Fool´s journey. There is a black bird and a white bird, and she carries the yan and ying symbols in her scales. Everything about her is split into black and white: her dress, her crown, her tools. The whole card is about duality, split into two and balance.
From mixing black and white you get grey and there is some grey in the picture: the frames, the text, and –interestingly- the Queen herself. Her naked skin is grey, it can be seen in her face and in her hands. So she has already integrated both colours and made it into a new mix within herself. She already walks in balance.



We discussed the black and white symbolism at length in our Ludy Lescott Study Group (http://www.tarotforum.net/showthread.php?t=166794).
I am quoting from there:

About Black and White symbolism:

Black and white "refers to an ambivalence or else to a union of the opposites in the realm of instinct." (Emma Jung, M-L von Franz: The Grail Legend)

" In mythology black and white are often not an ethical designation. They have become so only in late Christian allegory as a secondary, artificial interpretation.
In comparative mythology black generally stands for the nocturnal, the underwordly, the earthly, belonging to what cannot be consciously known, fertility and so on. White, on the other hand, stands for daylight, clarity, and order, but it can be either negative or positive, depending on the situation." (M-L.von Franz: Shadow and Evil in Fairy Tales, Shambhala 1995.)


"The image of the black and white magpie is the leitmotif (of the Holy Grail] which flits from chapter to chapter throughout the entire work...He (Percival) marries a black princess and they have a child who is both black and white..This is a natural dialectic as if the author is warning the reader to take the middle path. (M. Goodwin: The Holy Grail, 1994)

Then there is, of course, the Yan-Ying connection:
"Yin yang are not opposing forces (dualities), but complementary opposites that interact within a greater whole, as part of a dynamic system. Everything has both yin and yang aspects as light cannot exist without darkness and vice-versa, but either of these aspects may manifest more strongly in particular objects, and may ebb or flow over time. The concept of yin and yang is often symbolized by various forms of the Taijitu symbol, for which it is probably best known in western cultures.
There is a perception (especially in the West) that yin and yang correspond to evil and good. However, Taoist philosophy generally discounts good/bad distinctions and other dichotomous moral judgments, in preference to the idea of balance." (Wikipedia)




Some possible interpretations of this card:

* seeking balance, walking in balance
* interactions of opposing forces: night-day, good-evil, up-down, inside-outside, you-me, internal-external, body-spirit etc.
* midpoint of something (in LWB: the Fools Journey)

* be thoughtful, don´t jump headfirst into things, avoid impulsive acts
* wisdom, legal matters
* good mediator of counsellor
* healing: keeping systems in balance and functioning
* laws of nature, flow of biological systems
* excess in anything has consequences