1. Tarot
2. Card meanings
3. The High Priestess

Major Arcana · II

The High Priestess

• secrets
• mystery
• silence
• wisdom

Upright meaning

Quiet knowing. Waite links her with mystery, silence and wisdom: some things are spoken and some only implied. A card for listening inward and letting an answer ripen.

Reversed meaning

Reversed, she can point to surface knowledge, taking the first impression as the whole. A prompt to look a little deeper before deciding.

• surface knowledge

Symbolism

She sits between a dark and a light pillar, a crescent moon at her feet, holding a scroll partly hidden by her mantle.

Group

Major Arcana

Element, astrology

Not given by Waite, so we give none

Source

Our own plain-English summary of A. E. Waite, The Pictorial Key to the Tarot (London: Rider, 1911), Part II §2 (symbolism); Part III §3 (divinatory meanings). The keywords are Waite’s own words. Waite’s fortune-telling lists also contain harsher terms; we keep to the reflective readings he gives and never state an event as certain.

Tarot is a tool for reflection, not a prediction of fixed outcomes. This is not medical, legal or financial advice.