Minor Arcana · Swords · Air
Eight of Swords
Read to know yourself, not to surrender yourself: relate to the card; never obey it. These are what two traditions wrote, not predictions.
In Waite's words: The Pictorial Key to the Tarot (1911)
A woman, bound and hoodwinked, with the swords of the card about her. Yet it is rather a card of temporary durance than of irretrievable bondage.
A. E. Waite, The Pictorial Key to the Tarot (London: William Rider & Son, 1911), public domain.
In the Golden Dawn's Book T (1912)
Lord of Shortened Force
FOUR White Radiant Angelic Hands issuing from clouds, each holding two swords, points upwards; all the points touch near the top of the card. Hands issue, two at each bottom angle of the card. The pose of the other sword symbols is re-established in the centre. Above and below are the Decan symbols Jupiter and Gemini.
Too much force applied to small things: too much attention to detail at the expense of the principal and more important points. When ill dignified, these qualities produce malice, pettiness, and domineering characteristics. Patience in detail of study; great care in some things, counterbalanced by equal disorder in others. Impulsive; equally fond of giving or receiving money or presents; generous, clever, acute, selfish and without strong feeling of affection. Admires wisdom, yet applies it to small and unworthy objects.
Hod of ו (Narrow, restricted, petty, a prison).
Therein rule the Angels ומבאל and יההאל.
Correspondences
Book T as printed in The Equinox I(8), 1912, public domain (notes in square brackets are Crowley's). The correspondences are this site's compilation from Book T. Open it in the Golden Dawn deck.