Why Tarot Works

You are not imagining things

Sola Busca Tarot, late fifteenth century

Tarot is among the most beguiling objects in contemporary life.

Its history, while meaningful, is less illustrious than some seekers believe. Yet Tarot proves confoundingly efficacious as a divinatory tool. Cries of “confirmation bias!” be damned—Tarot’s oracular qualities are defensible on grounds of logic.

This article explores Tarot’s full dimensions: worldly, historical, and occult. It ends with a rare secret. Those who avoid skipping ahead will gain more from it. -M-

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I must begin with record-straightening history. What I write is quotidian and workmanlike. Much else that I explore is anything but.

To start with, the use of Tarot as a divinatory device is a modern innovation, as is its mythos as an ancient book of wisdom.

The first Tarot decks, not yet bearing the name, emerged as a game in Northern Italy in the early 1400s. Wishful or I-it-heard-somewhere speculation aside, that is our earliest physical and period evidence of Tarot.

This fact does not always sit well. After saying this in a Gaia documentary, I was called “an active agent of disinformation.” It was not unprecedented. Including from skeptics. You can decide for yourself.