Few things are more exciting to me than stumbling across a text or image that perfectly reflects a tarot card, especially when it makes me reconsider my ideas about that card.
Today I read the following in the mystery novel A Rule Against Murder by Louise Penny. Chief Inspector Armand Gamache, head of homicide for the Sûreté du Québec, says to a family at their annual reunion:
“We believe Madame Martin was murdered.”
There was a stunned silence. He’d seen that transition almost every day of his working life. He often felt like a ferryman, taking men and women from one shore to another. From the rugged, though familiar, terrain of grief and shock into a netherworld visited by a blessed few. To a shore where men killed each other on purpose.
They’d all seen it from a safe distance, on television, in the papers. They’d all known it existed, this other world. Now they were in it. . . .
No place was safe.
Ah, a perfect rendition of the Six of Swords! I was first struck by it being from the viewpoint of the ferryman, not the passengers. A ferryman who is compassionately aware of the deep emotional shifts of those he is transporting—but not partaking directly in those shifts. For a moment I thought, ‘But, of course, the Six of Swords is about the ferryman, not necessarily the passengers! A ferryman who again and again observes this shift taking place in those he ferries. A ferryman who is both separate and yet momentarily involved.’
There is no indication that the author, Louise Penny, had the tarot card in mind. Rather this is a common classical metaphor linking Charon and the river Styx to the family of a murdered person being ferried out of the world-as-they-had-known-it to a shore previously viewed only as a distant abstraction.
I often ask a querent, “Where are you in the card?” With the Six of Swords, the querent is always one of the figures, but it could equally be the ferryman or the hunched-over adult or the child. By contrast, with other cards, the querent occasionally sees him or herself standing just beyond the borders, behind a column, or, in the case of the Tower, still inside the structure—divorced from the action.
With the Six of Swords there is usually an eventual recognition that the querent is all three persons in the boat. As ferryman, the querent tends to feel he or she is in charge or at least doing something active that will lead to a better end. As passengers, anxiety or grief tends to trump hope, yet there is still a belief that the destination will be better than the “familiar terrain of grief and shock” that they’ve just left.
Interestingly, in the novel, the seven main suspects had, just the day before, gone out together in the lake on a boat—a passage fraught with animosity and repressed danger. The Chief Inspector/ferryman recognizes that the new world they are now facing will be more terrifying than the passengers ever could have imagined. Furthermore, they aren’t just visitors—blessed because they can leave—they will soon be inhabitants. There’s no going back. Grief and shock may exist in the land of the innocent. But, in the land of the experienced, as William Blake well knew, wrath and fear dominate, and the ferryman can’t stop it from happening. (See Blake’s Poems of Innocence and Poems of Experience.)
How different the card looks to me now. It is full of foreboding, and yet there is calm in knowing that this is an inevitable journey from the false safety of innocence into the land of Blake’s experience where realities will finally be faced. As in all murder mysteries the truth will be revealed. But, in an actual reading, is the client always ready to hear such truths?
Doesn’t the admonition, “to know thyself,” mean that we have to come to know and take responsibility for the part within ourselves who “kills another”? Both the querent and the reader want the other shore to be better than the one from which they’ve come, but there are times when we have to go through much worse. What is the reader to tell the client? And, here there are no easy answers.
I hope this makes me stop and think before I blurt out cheerfully, “Oh, you are going through a transition from the rough waters of the past to smooth waters ahead.” Sometimes I, the reader, am the ferryman/chief inspector, who must recognize with compassion that real detection can strip the soul bare and set one in the dread grasp of Blake’s tyger and not in the rejoicing vales of the lamb (see poems here). The rest of the Sword suit (7–10) warns what may come from a detection of the wrongs, or what comes to light when one really wants to “know thyself.” Does the querent really want to go there, or is the querent trusting the reader to ferry them to a safe harbor?
Still, I think it helps the reader—the ferryman who steers the way through the cards in a spread from one’s familiar anxieties to a different shore—to consider what may be truly implied from such a scene in the suit of Swords. This new perspective reminds me that in a reading I am attempting to steer the course when I don’t always know what is lying in wait for my passenger on the other side or how prepared my passenger might be to meet that. It is a grave responsibility.
23 comments
Comments feed for this article
July 21, 2010 at 3:22 pm
Robert Moss
Hi Mary – Thank you for this elegant and thought-provoking piece. The title for the most important spiritual teacher in the Jain tradition (if memory serves) means The Ferryman.
I like to use the Tarot cards as you do here – as memory boxes in which I will store a collection of favorite stories from many sources, ranging from folklore and literature to incidents that followed a particular reading. The right story will then pop up when the card I associate with it is drawn, as the jack pops out of the box when the lid is opened.
July 21, 2010 at 3:32 pm
The Tarot Lady
Hi Mary – this is brilliant. I too tend to view this card as a passage into smoother waters. I cannot believe I rarely thought to think about the ferryman and all the doors of interpretation that can lead to! Very insightful and new food for my tarot lovin’ brain.
Thank you!
Theresa
July 21, 2010 at 5:38 pm
Toni Gilbert
Hi Mary, Yes, interesting perspective…I too usually focus upon the riders and the traditional perspective.
Also, in the way I use the cards, I ask the client to tell me about the scene in the card before I offer an interpretation. That way I can get a glimpse of what is in their mind. Most of the time, they are right on and their interpretations match the traditional one, but sometimes, like your experience here, they offer a perspective that is quite creative….beginners mind. Toni
July 21, 2010 at 6:25 pm
Koneta
Thanks Mary for sharing this, I had never given the Ferryman any notice really before. He was just a guy doing his job. Hmmmm. How many times have I over looked or dismissed a “Ferryman” simply because they are someone who is just doing their job. I’m sure this guy could tell some tales. Time for me to take notice and hear what he has to say. Koneta
July 21, 2010 at 7:10 pm
Kaira Sherman
Fabulous article Mary!!! Love the analogies to the 6 of swords and how the quarent could be all 3 in the boat. A woman I know from San Diego used to say that the six of swords meant that we are following the same old patterns again and again with repeat behavior…..”you see the six swords are sinking the boat!”
Blessings,
Kaira Sherman
July 21, 2010 at 7:11 pm
david vine
Oh, Mary!
One night last November, in the wee hours, I was awakened from a sound sleep by a voice which said, very clearly:
“The Tarot is the Prow that Parts the Mists… Look at the Six of Swords”.
I jumped out of bed, grabbed my cards and found the Six. I could see immediately that the punter with the pole represents the reader, the woman in the boat is the querent, and the “child” sitting beside is her own intuition of Higher Self. The boat, as the voice had suggested, is the Tarot. In this way, as readers, we are true “psychopomps”, accompanying and guiding the psyche of the querent by means of the Tarot, which is a vehicle capable of penetrating the mists of illusion, to the other side of deeper understanding.
I had recognized a long time ago that the boat in the RWS Six of Swords was a traditional English punt, a long flat-bottomed boat ordinarily used for recreation on rivers and ponds. The word “punt”, from the Latin “ponto”, is itself derived from the Latin “pons” meaning “bridge”. So the actual type of boat in the image reinforces the reader’s role in helping bring the querent’s consciousness from point A to point B.
David
July 21, 2010 at 9:27 pm
Erin
Hi Mary,
Thank you for this new facet to add to my understanding of this card. I doubt I’ll ever be done collecting new angles. Up until now, my standard interpretation of this card is to identify with the ferryman, who ferries her own boat in the Gilded Tarot. The “passengers” are the swords themselves, symbols of lessons learned through experience. This has always signified a voluntary “moving on”, choosing to leave behind the relative security of the shores of the past because she outgrew them, or having the simple faith that things will work out as they should, realizing that there is more to this journey than the last battle that she survived. I’ve always seen the woman in the boat as a brave soul who had the courage and wisdom to learn from her past and forge ahead. I never thought of considering the querent as a compassionate helper (the ferryman) or as the passengers who are left with no choice but to move on against their will.
Thank you so much for this!
Erin
July 22, 2010 at 12:58 am
Amethyst Tiger
Interesting and thought provoking comments Mary.
Taking the Inspector’s/Ferryman’s perspective, what we are really witnessing then, is a loss of innocence. Maybe that’s the cost of the journey to the other shore.
July 22, 2010 at 3:06 am
nisaba000
Mary, this is a fascinating take. It takes me back to an occasion about eighteen years ago, when I had a live-in partner and a very young baby. We had dual computers: mine in the living-room, my partner’s in the bedroom. The baby was asleep, my partner was tapping away on the keyboard quite rhythmically. I was lying on my back on the bed, meditating with no particular direction. Everything around me turned silver, and I was in a silver landscape that reminded me of the foreshores of the nearby (real) river a few kilometers away. I was standing on the eastern bank of the river. I had no shadow. The sky and water were both bright silver. The land underfoot was a duller silver. The hills beyond the far bank were black. There was a jetty in front of me, built of ricketty, splintery, grey-weathered wood, leading into the silver water, with a black flat-bottomed barge tied up at the end of the jetty. The Ferryman was on the barge, waiting, utterly still. Just a black robe and a black hood, a grey hand holding a pole.voluntarily, I walked about halfway along the jetty, feeling the irregular and at times painful wood under my bare feet. I paused. The ferryman held up his free hand, palm upwards, in invitation. No words were spoken. I knew immediately what was meant. I was being offered a one-way “free ride” to the other bank. Once there, I would not be able to come back. I would immediately know what was on the other side. I would get to die without a lengthy, protracted illness, and without traumatic pain and physical damage. No one would be able to find a cause of death on autopsy. The idea of a painless death and otherworldly knowledge was very tempting, but I had a young child to raise. I wanted my partner, who was quite intuitive, to realise something was wrong and at least hesitate in typing to give me a reason to come back, but they didn’t even notice so I had to make this decision alone, and I still sometimes regret it, the alternative I didn’t take was so appealing.
The Ferryman is indeed very real, and crucial, ironically, for our lives. You cannot learn to live fully until you have actually faced the reality of death and dying: it is death that gives life meaning.
July 22, 2010 at 6:26 am
Nan Harvey
Mary, thank you.
Last week I started working with an alternative healer to help me leave behind a year of betrayal, heartbreak and later death. She told me to watch for a guide to show up in my Tarot readings. The night before I saw this post I did a three card reading that showed the Six of Swords in my future. Then, I awoke and found this!
I know as I work through this I will be leaving behind the relative safety of the known feelings (“familiar terrain of grief and shock”) and heading towards – something else. And if I am to grow I have to go there.
July 22, 2010 at 8:10 am
Mark Gosser
I love this post. The ferryman has a depressed, almost defeated posture and sometimes I see him as part of the group instead of just guiding a woman and child across the water. It’s not a happy scene. For one thing, being surrounded by swords, the woman is taking her problems with her. “No matter where you go there you are.” Maybe a new location will help her break free. The child represents her hopes and dreams, her talents and gifts. She hasn’t given up, but it’s not a happy journey. In 12 step programs this is called a “geographic.” There’s always a chance that a change of scenery will help manifest better conditions, but more often than not we’re still the same in new surroundings.
July 22, 2010 at 7:40 pm
Avigayil
Thank-you! I’ve been thinking about the themes of myth repeating throughout religions and then showing up in pop culture. ie. Romeo and Juliet to West Side Story. This fits in perfectly with my current mindset.
This card specifically is a troublesome card. BUT– what about the swords sticking INTO the boat? Is it going to sink? Are they penetrating the wood or magically suspended just inside the boat?
In Hebrew, the letter vav’s numerical value is 6. The letter derives from an image of either a phallus or an oar– both are instruments of connection. The oar brings you from shore to shore. In Hebrew grammar, vav serves as the conjunction, “and.”
The letter zayin, numerical value 7, derives from a sword. There is a kerris sword that looks very much like the letter zayin.
just some food for thought. 7 is completion of a week(time). Shabbat, you “cut off” from the workweek. In 7 of swords, I get a sense of conniving behavior. Trickery is a way to Cut off from others.
Great exchange of ideas; hope you enjoy my musings as well.
Blessings,
Avigayil
July 22, 2010 at 7:43 pm
Avigayil
makes me think of Herman Hesse’s book, “Siddhartha.” Remember the ferryman? He was very wise, Sid’s ultimate teacher and what he eventually became. Perhaps our ultimate goal in life is to become a ferryperson for others, a truly, gifted teacher who can help others navigate the waters of life.
July 22, 2010 at 11:55 pm
Bee
Great post!
I don’t think I have as much to add as some of the others, however I will say that looking at the RWS image you posted after reading everything written sort of gives me the chills now! Though taking it a step further, I look at one of the passengers, hunched over and wonder if even he/she might have a hint at what the other side of the river might hold.
July 23, 2010 at 12:31 pm
Kaira Sherman
Hi Avigayil and All,
I enjoyed your post and it occured to me after seeing the Hebrew translations you mentioned with 6’s and 7’s that they add up to 13 or Death and endings….as we see happening in the Six of Swords as the boat rows away from a situation back on shore. I prefer to look at 13 as the number of the Goddess and crawling into fetal position to be cradled in the Greath Mother’s arms. Maybe in this scene of the Six of Swords we could also see the Ferryman as Berinthis (sp) from the shores of Avalon either taking the priestess and her child from the mundane back to Avalon.
B.B.
Kaira
July 24, 2010 at 12:25 pm
Rozonda
Beautifully expressed, Mary.
I’ve often found in my readings that the 6 of Swords announced difficult times and necessary changes, and smoother waters weren’t that close. The Ferryman parts the waters and mists so the reader learns to see clearly what lies ahead- and sometimes it is not that appealing.
July 26, 2010 at 7:32 pm
Daniel
Thank you for this insight – I love seeing deeper parts to the tools!
July 26, 2010 at 7:48 pm
Daniel Erikkson
Beautiful insight – thank you Mary
July 27, 2010 at 10:33 pm
LunaXis
twelve years a go I am inspired to learn Tarot through Mythic deck. Reading this blog post, I am still inspired by you. I shall look at all figures in the cards since now and understand their parts. Thank you.
July 28, 2010 at 6:09 pm
Victoria Evangelina
…never ending journey of learning Tarot… after all the years of devoted study you still find new insights!… thank you for sharing them with such simple grace and inspiring all of us to look deeper into the cards and our souls and experiences…
August 2, 2010 at 8:31 am
LadyHawk
Thank you for sharing! I love reading these in depth articles that Spirit sends my way…they enrich my own Tarot experiences and then flow on to those I read for too!
May 13, 2013 at 9:58 pm
Joan
I have just literally run away from an abusive relationship. After a few repeated attempts in my delusion and wishful thinking, I was physically attacked. The shock and awe still with me. I am resting and my reading also included the 4 of swords, so that makes sense. Oddly enough too, I am on a competitive rowing team this year, so this card represents my goals. The Ferryman or Fairy Godmother, protection, unseen forces, angels. I do feel that. Also as the Ferrywoman, I am in full control, I know where and how to go where I need to. Choices.
This ugly event also brought up my inner child, so vulnerable and also whom had been crippled from the past. The woman, or adult figure, in huddled protective position, is frozen in fear and in need of help. I have reached out to many, I have remained composed but have let others in the know. Yes calmer shores, resting, escape from disaster, having time to process reality. Calmer shores ahead, definitely. I was a happy camper, until someone burned down my camp. I leave for a new shore a new reality, but with the knowledge that there are mean spirited and dysfunctional people in the world.
I land on the other shore, taking with me those six swords to protect me on my future journey. I must take off the rose and adorn myself in the silver of the metal. I am still who I am, but gladly have more awareness and the power to walk away. My childhood innocence has been defeated, now the adult, I put away the “games”
I am in the know of the rusty world around me, I must act through self love, self awareness and self protection into my future. I realize that the only way to accept responsibility for the past is to adjust my future with clarity. Then the inner leader will come forth with confidence. Then I will know myself. If I could add an object to this card it would be a red flag around the oar. If I could paint another card, There would only be the one woman on the next shore, sun shining, the 3 of the trinity have combined.
She packs all of the 5 of swords of (the abuser) and she hones a sixth sword of victory, the 6 of wands was the outcome card. Still loving, fair and just she is the Queen of Cups (Crowning Card) All is well that ends well.
A mist has risen upon the river, the far side no longer can be seen at this distance.
August 1, 2019 at 12:04 am
A Slew of Swords | Laura Fitzgerald Tarot
[…] the ferryman who steers the way through the cards in a spread from one’s familiar anxieties to a different shore. … (I)n a reading I am attempting to steer the course when I don’t always know what is lying in wait for my passenger on the other side or how prepared my passenger might be to meet that. It is a grave responsibility. (https://marykgreer.com/2010/07/21/ferryman-in-the-six-of-swords/) […]