V The Hierophant
aka The Sacred (hiero) Reveal (phant)
Invitations
Elemental Ally: Water
Crystal (mineral) Ally: Bone
Animal Allies: The Antlered
Dating The Hierophant: Pour yourself a cup of water, thank it. Sip it while you journal about your religious upbringing, your spiritual journey and how you ended up here, dating The Hierophant.
To date this card is to also date water. As my herbalism teacher Amanda Nicole taught me, I invite you to pick four magazine images that call to you, then write a word that is resounding from it on it. For a month rest a cup of water over the image overnight before drinking it in the morning. Switch the image each week. Make note of how you feel and anything happening in your life.
The Roof of the World
*This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, business, events and incidents are the products of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
The market is bustling, a bell clangs from a sheep's neck and the sweet smoke of a cooking fire swirls like a tidal pool of swimming air.
“Nadee is shedding for the first time.”
Nadee's nomadic mother is sharing with a potato vendor from the east.
“send along my blessings.”
He hands her a sack of golden potatoes and a wizened and warm smile for her yak stew, she intends to cauldron for Nadee's shedding celebration. She needs no homing device but for her sharp nose to rejoin her tribe, as they prepare their herd for the journey north to the head waters.
“It came in a dream.”
Nadee shrugs and laughs as the elders speculate on the ritual gifted through a young one's subconscious. They are bundled in furs as their horses steady trot towards the future. No hats, but scarves spiral around faces and drape in the napes of antlers reaching to the heavens.
“It is not our task to understand spirit, but to trust how it moves through us. Blessed be child, we move with you as spirit moves through you.”
Camp is set up along the water’s edge. The cookfire is stoked. Like baby teeth Nadee’s sweet one point antlers release from his crown as if hopping off a galactic train stop just in time for their connection. A golden key sharper than a saw is put to use creating little circles in order to send out as many as possible to the world beyond time.
Each elder cups the ice cold water in their hands, offering a womb for each piece. Nadee walks behind them, dropping a section of his spirit into these wells of welcome. With the anticipation of an intense game of duck duck goose, the elders shoulders rise waiting for the cue to birth the spirituality of collective consciousness to the sacred water, to infuse it with magic.
“Send them far and wide grandfathers.”
And so they do, each antler ring plunking into the river, some catching a current, others sinking to the bottom of somewhere. Nadee’s mother wraps the elder’s frozen fingers around hot bowls of stew. They eat and laugh into the night as they welcome the regrowth of new antlers to come.
So it is that, Nadee and his antlered tribe release circles of cross sectioned antler into the ancient flowing water. Each early winter they brave the northern cold to perform this ritual with no expectation of return or reward. Ritual for ritual’s sake, a time long before capitalism gave us ‘purpose’.
They submerge and spread their desire to reach the highest spiritual clouds attainable on Earth by tossing these rounds of antler into the headwaters, like lovers flipping coins into fountains unfathomable moons later.
Little does Nadee know the impact this ritual will have 40,000 years after his earthly existence. When, even the idea of humans having antlers is scientifically absurd.
Water carried your antler from the roof of the world to the toes of a girl searching for meaning.
Little did she know, she'd receive your origin story, Nadee. The start of collective spirituality. Oh, how we've misconstrued and misused this pursuit. And yet, rest assured, the water keepers, protectors, nature connectors and tree lovers are awakening to your story.
Turning to gaze at the water flowing from the corners, snapping out of the gray pillared halls of repressive devotion and remembering and accepting your magic as above, so below.
Card Analysis
Nadee has grown old and now fulfills the role of the elder, offering a cup of water to house the next young hierophant’s heavenly reaching anter gift. The icefield melts and becomes sparse behind him feeding the headwaters. A distant sun keeps him warm as he sits at the altar known as river. A golden key points down to the water, signifying its potent magic of holding all the memories of Earth’s existence, the secrets of what came before and the all the answers a young seeker desires. Nadee gazes up to the next generation as if to say, “if you learn anything, let it be to honor the water.”
“A drop of water, if it could write out its own history, would explain the universe to us.”
know this
The day I found his antler in the water, was the day I knew water was the message. Making The Hierophant the messenger. If you seek a spiritual mentor, go ask the water. When you find your mentor, tell them Water sent you. Pay attention to their response. If they bring you to the waters of their knowledge, bathe you in the ancients, hydrate you with thanked tea, splash the laughter of our ancestors over you, this is your wise teacher. Welcome home.
reversal note
One of the first ways I remembered this card was to call it “the mansplainer.” Seeing as we just exited the loving arms of our own Emperor, into a world of Shadow Emperor energy, manifested as The Patriarchy. Yikes! I love Pixie’s illustration of this card in her deck, I interpret it as almost mocking the patriarchy.
The two bald men and the overly serious hierophant. The hidden female reproduction art on the gray pillars. lol. If this card comes up in reverse, or your stomach drops at it arriving in your spread, this is a signal to reflect on your relationship to organized religion, to ask yourself if perhaps there is a guru before you whom no longer requires your devotion. Breathe deeply and consider your next spiritual move.