KEYWORDS: Auspicious turn of events.
With the next revolution of the Wheel, we spin off into yet another level of our evolutionary process. The Wheel of Life illustrates the constancy of nature’s everexpanding cyclical changes; light to dark, ebb to flow, life to death to life.
The planet Jupiter rules this card; in earlier decks, the concept of luck, chance or fate (as in the Wheel of Fortune) was an appropriate interpretation. In The Wheel of Life, we don’t see luck or fate as something that suddenly drops into our laps or hands. Rather, it is the gift which comes as a result of an awareness of cycles and timing.
Being generally pretty self-centered, we are usually spinning in small circles around the hub of this great Wheel, enmeshed in our day-to-day struggles. As a result, we often miss the Jupiterian “Big Picture.” Opening up our vantage point toward the circumference of the Wheel, we become capable of a more philosophical overview of cyclical events. From this perspective, we are better positioned to make our own luck, or consciously to reap the benefits of a cycle which has come to term.
The Wheel is the universal symbol for cycles. The symbolism of the Wheel is also referred to thus by Neumann: “In the Western Middle Ages, we find a symbol corresponding exactly to the Tibetan Wheel of Life, this is the wheel of life… as Wheel of Mother Nature, on which the ascending cycle of human life is represented. Below, the wheel is held by the Earth Goddess, above, on a throne sits three-headed Time (i.e., an angel-like female figure) whose wings are the months and who makes life revolve with the alternations of day and night.”
For my image of the Wheel of Life, I included a composite of various cyclic symbols. I drew heavily on the Tantric images of Kali, the White Dakini and the triple-headed Goddess image, above the circumference of the Wheel.
The ancient Tantric tradition is extremely important; it is the only portion of the Hindu religion that reveres women and discourages the racist caste system. This tradition may also underly the origins of the female-centered Sufi sect.
Enthroned on the Wheel is a triple-headed winged Goddess. Her first aspect is the “white dove (the virgin creatrix)”; the second is the “blood red serpent (the Mother and preserver)”; and the last is the “black sow (the Crone and destroyer)”. Her two six-fold wings represent the 12 months of the year.
Rising from the bottom of the Wheel is the White Dakini, an embodiment of female wisdom-energy. The Dakinis, or Skywalkers, were Tantric priestesses and attendant spirits to Kali, their mistress. The sixtyfour Dakinis are traditionally expressions of archetypal energies within each person. According to Tantric teaching, the visualization of each of these archetypes can bring about profound alterations in one’s consciousness; this is yet another turn of the wheel.
Below the Dakini is Kali, the birth-death Goddess who is “simultaneously womb and tomb, giver of life and devourer of her children.” Kali’s name literally meant “Black Mother Time” and Hers was a world of “eternal living flux from which all things rose and disappeared again, in endless cycles.” She appears as the black devouring crone with protruding tongue and wide, all-seeing eyes wearing Her traditional skull-necklace.
At the hub of the Wheel sits the Sphinx, a symbol of our essence, which never changes from lifetime to lifetime. Around her whirls a Lemurian Wheel of Life symbol. She is also the focus of a smaller zodiac wheel, complete with all the astrological signs and symbols. The lower hemisphere is dark, representing the night, while the upper portion is light like the day.
As in the Rider/Waite, around the wheel of the zodiac appear the letters T-A-R-O-T. Viewed from both sides, they form five anagrams which together form a cryptic phrase: TARO ROTA ORAT TORA ATOR meaning respectively and collectively: The royal road–the wheel, speaks the law of Ator (Hathor or Mother Nature). To my mind, rearranging these same four letters to create different words and concepts is symbolic of reincarnation; we try on different bodies and personalities to learn each lesson.
When receiving this card, know that you are on the brink of a major change. This is an auspicious time and the end of a cycle of development. The boons or failures that you incur at this time are directly related to your own efforts in the past. As the Great Wheel turns under the watchful eye of Kali, remember that with the beginning of each new cycle we get another chance.
