← “Röhrig Cards” deck

The Tower

“Röhrig Cards” deck · card #16

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"Now or never! I must seize this precious moment."
Friedrich Schiller

The gathered energy of the previous card (the Devil) has run out of control and caused destruction. The fortress has been struck and broken into two parts.

The Tower embodies the architecture of human thought. It is the structure we have built in order to hide within it. It is our ego and everything we have devised in order to protect that ego. In the French Tarot decks, this card bears the name La Maison de Dieu — the House of God.

Three builders worked to raise this Tower. The first is ignorance (that is, not knowing the fact, not knowing the fact that spiritual teachings must not be materialized, but belong to the spiritual sphere). The second builder is fanaticism, whose ego tries to shut the gates of the house of God and bar the entry of others, because: "I can do it better," "I know better," or "Others are not worthy." The third builder is ambition, arrogance, which wants to raise the highest Tower, pierce the heavens and reach God. In this light, each of us builds our own Tower of Babel, a structure in which we are at once prisoner and jailer, until lightning strikes, shaking and destroying our Tower — but, at the same time, setting us free.

The Tower symbolizes a society which, through its own arrogance and lack of wisdom, regards itself as the center of the universe and exploits it, taking into account its supposedly inherent right to exploit the planet. Until a fundamental reassessment takes place, human society should not be surprised if, one day, the annihilating lightning truly does strike, breaking everything in its path.

But the devastation depicted on this card also carries the seeds of healing. Those who have survived and lived through this phase of loss know that a material, intellectual or spiritual upheaval cannot destroy their deepest essence. They recognize God and His all-knowing freedom, and know that this intense experience, at this phase, has contributed to their spiritual maturation.

On the sixteenth card of the Tarot of the Aquarian Age you see the Tower, which looks destroyed, without any outward impulse. The door of the Tower is closed; communication with the outer world is no longer possible. Inside the Tower is a bright room, where spiritual energy has been gathered. Blocked energies, deprived of any outlet, lead to the dangerous situation depicted on this card: they must break their chains.

The floor of the bright room is paved with a checkerboard pattern of black and white squares. This alludes to two planes within human beings: the material plane (black) and the spiritual plane (white). People cannot overcome the division that separates them from the higher sphere until they transform the matter in which they live (that is, their own physical bodies). This transformation is necessary so that body and spirit can survive the shattering trial that this card symbolizes.

As might be expected, the astrological sign of this card is the planet Mars in its destructive, annihilating aspect as the God of War. But we must not forget that new construction will follow destruction. This time, the architecture of the Tower will express our deeper understanding of structures and foundations — or we may freely choose not to build another Tower at all.

The Hebrew letter of this card, PE, means "mouth" or "tongue." It is said to be "the mouth through which God speaks." We also know that "God spoke, and the word was created," and this word embodies the word spoken by God. But the words formed by a human mouth are likewise waiting to take shape. Whether a person thinks, weeps or laughs, and whether they wish it or not, everything they have ever thought or said will return to stand before them one day. Think thoughts of love and speak words of friendship, and you will render the greatest service to the planet. The power of destruction that befalls the Tower will pass us by without harm, and the planet will once again become what it once was — a corner of paradise.

The rune of the Tower is IR (yr), and its meaning is the opposite of what is denoted by the rune ELHAZ on the previous card. The vital energy in ELHAZ has become blocked energy in IR, and everything will keep exploding until change comes about through PE, the mouth.

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