THE DEVIL

XV

THE DEVIL--RULED BY CAPRICORN

KEYWORDS: Material values or things, mental depression, and (watch how you use this one) unwillingness to free yourself.

Spiritual Meaning: You alone have the ability to free yourself from your own bondages in life.

Here you have a creature, half man, half beast, who seems to be in control of the man and the woman in front of him. If you look closely, however, you will see that the chains around the two of them are loose and they could free themselves if they truly wanted to. This means that they are allowing themselves to be bound, whether it be bondage to material things, ideas, or another person. This card can also represent mental depression, a form of self-bondage.

Look at the star on top of The Devil's head. It is a five-pointed star and is "upside down". When the star is "right-side up" there is one point at the top, two points extending to each side and two points which "touch the ground". In that position it represents mankind, the top point representing his head, the two side points representing his arms and the two bottom points representing his legs. When seen in this way it means that the head rules the lower elements. When seen reversed, with two points at the top, as seen on this card, it means that the person is allowing his lower, or animal nature to rule his head (life). In other words, his passions or desires rule his head.

Capricorn, the Astrological Ruler of this card, rules material possessions, so your first thought when working with this card should be bondage to something material. It could be a car, home, even a table.

The number of this card is Fifteen, One being the self, or ego, Five meaning that you must be willing to make changes, and the combination number of Six meaning you must accept responsibility. I have given the breakdown of the number, as well as the combined number, as to what it means in this case, that you (one--self, ego) must be willing to make changes (five--changes) and accept the reesponsibility (six) for freeing yourself from material bondage.

(Updated 2006. All rights reserved.)