PKT (Pictorial Key to the Tarot) vs Book T

[Celine]

There might be a bout of laziness in my question:  I admit that in Book T I went straight to what looked like meanings, so usually the list of words after the flourished description. I found those "lists" interesting though sometimes antithetic terms lost me. The rest was too much for me (qabbalah and astrology).

 

My question is: do you combine those with the PKT or do you keep them strictly apart? For example for the 8 of Pentacles, said to be Lord of Prudence (not negative in my view) Book T seems quite negative about it ("penny wise, pound foolish"). The PKT talks about craftsmanship though possibly in its early stages. @Katrinka here said "Prudence. Measure twice, cut once".

I have found many posts recommending the PKT, very few the Book T applied to RWS. Yet former user @timtoldrum mentions how Pamela Colman strictly followed Book T on this one. Someone here said Eden Gray was a PKT lite yet unless I misremember, she goes for apprenticeship.

Sometimes it feels like Book T gives the "gist" of it, and the PKT the more mundane, everyday application.

I've also seen someone on a private blog using Book T meanings on RWS (including the keywords related to the sephirot (? Not sure)) and it was beautiful and made me look into it (had never heard of Book T prior to that). I'm surprised I don't see that many people refer to it for the RWS.

 

What is your approach?

 

And when "opposing " terms are listed in Book T, do you envisage them as one when well dignified, the other when ill dignified?

(I'm still very much studying Lenormand but each time I feel I'm getting closer/better to/at a cartomantic approach, I have the hope to take it to tarot)

[Rose Lalonde]

Hi.   Crowley's Book of Thoth is kinder:

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It signifies intelligence lovingly applied to material matters, especially those of the agriculturalist, the artificer and the engineer.

 

For me, there's a core meaning they're all pointing to for 8D about care and attention to detail related to day to day or material things. That can be great, productive, talented, and organized, or we can go get so focused in that we lose sight of the big picture or need everything to be perfect in just the way we imagine, regardless of what others involved might think.  There are many ways to decide where a card falls on that spectrum in a reading - reversals - dignity - astrology. I include the latter, but basically read a line of 3 in order left to right and in relation to the question. If it's about a work project and I pull 8D - Tower - 7C, careful organization will go out the window, and instead of trying to rein things in, a more flexible and experimental approach is the better way forward. But if I pull 7C - Tower - 8D then after following too many tangents and the project going pear shaped, Prudence will be the best way to bring order to a chaotic work process.

 

I used to be very worried about the rules for these things. But having received many great readings from people who read in a totally different way than I do over the years, I just think it's a matter of finding a method that works for you and then being consistent with it at least for a while, so you can do readings and see how they come out. You probably do already, but I found journaling helpful. 🙂 

Edited 19 hours ago by Rose Lalonde

[Celine]

Thank you - you're right, the way you sum it up with care, attention, and the material is very nice. I realise as soon as I approach tarot I fall in the ditch I was in when I discovered it, I see the myriad of things and lose the core meaning. Something I manage more or less not to do in Lenornand.

But are you saying you use the book of Thoth with RWS? My (very poorly formulated) post was the result of perplexity as to whether people simply dissed the Book T in favour of the PKT or found them complementary.

Ok, writing it down I realise it's something I might as well figure out for myself first 😄

I was simply very perplexed all at once.

[Rose Lalonde]

2 hours ago, Celine said:

But are you saying you use the book of Thoth with RWS?

No,  I just pulled Crowley in because both he and Waite were Golden Dawn Society members who based their decks off the same correspondences as in Book T, so there’s some overlap in core meanings.  (And I more often read with Thoth decks.) But that was confusing of me since you’re talking about PKT here. 

[Celine]

Thanks for clearing that up.

And :

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18 hours ago, Rose Lalonde said:

it's a matter of finding a method that works for you and then being consistent with it at least for a while, so you can do readings and see how they come out

 

Yes, this seems to be THE thing for every system, sticking to one method first and go from there. I have been so fascinated by how that reader tapped into Book T that I think I'll go that route for now. "Commencement of matters to be established later" is the phrase that pulled me in. Thanks for having taken the time to reply !