The Meaning of the 22 Major Arcana in the Classical Tarot

An Overview of the 22 Major Arcana

The Tarot deck has 78 cards split into two parts: the 22 Major Arcana and the 56 Minor Arcana. Where the Minor Arcana describe the day-to-day currents of life, the Major Arcana speak to the larger lessons — the spiritual milestones every soul must pass through.

"Arcana" in Latin means secret. Each Major Arcana card holds a secret of the soul — an ancient archetype that appears across every culture, whether you call it the Emperor, Hermes, the Fool or the Seeker.

The Fool's Journey Through 21 Stages

The most common — and most beautiful — approach is to read the 22 Major Arcana as one continuous story: the Fool's Journey. The Fool (card 0) steps off the cliff empty-handed and open-hearted. Every card that follows is a teacher, a trial, a door.

The journey ends at The World (card XXI) — where the Fool returns to oneness with the universe, yet can still set off on the next loop with a new zero. Tarot isn't a straight line. Tarot is a spiral.

Every card you draw doesn't tell you the future — it asks which chapter you're living in.

— Rachel Pollack, Seventy-Eight Degrees of Wisdom

The Meaning of Each Major Arcana Card in Detail

Below are all 22 cards in the order of the Rider-Waite-Smith deck — the most influential Tarot deck since 1909 and the foundation of nearly every modern deck. Each card shows its Roman numeral, name and three core keywords.

Reading in Triads — An Advanced Approach

An advanced technique is to divide the 21 remaining cards (setting aside card 0 — the Fool walks through all of them) into three sets of seven, each corresponding to a layer of consciousness:

• I – VII · The conscious layer — From The Magician to The Chariot: learning to act in the material world, building the ego.
• VIII – XIV · The subconscious layer — From Strength to Temperance: turning inward, facing the shadow, learning to release and to be reborn.
• XV – XXI · The superconscious layer — From The Devil to The World: overcoming the final binds, reaching awakening, becoming one with the universe.

How to Practise Tarot Daily

Tarot isn't fortune-telling — it's a mirror. To truly understand the 22 Major Arcana, turn them into a daily practice, not a memorisation exercise:

1. Draw one card in the morning. Ask: "What energy will walk with me today?" Jot a short note in your journal.
2. Reflect in the evening. Compare the card you drew with an event from your day — the connection is often more obvious than you'd expect.
3. Track for 22 days. After three weeks, you'll notice each card has a distinct "voice" — that's when Tarot starts speaking back to you.

Conclusion — What Comes Next

The 22 Major Arcana aren't a list to memorise — they're 22 companions on your inner journey. Each card has its own season: sometimes The Tower arrives to break down what no longer fits; sometimes The Star opens in the middle of a long night; sometimes The Fool returns to invite you into the next chapter.

Begin by drawing one Tarot card — and let Kalune interpret it for you alongside your personal numerology chart.