TL;DR: Waite wrote in The Pictorial Key to the Tarot (1911) that The Lovers is the card of human love, with divinatory meanings of attraction, love, beauty, overcoming trials, and reversed meanings of failure, foolish calculations. In modern Tarot reading, this card is often understood as connection, important choice, harmony upright, and imbalance or wrong choice reversed. Nhật Nguyệt suggests: identify core values before deciding, and do not view the card as a certain prediction of the future.
What does The Lovers Tarot card mean?
The Lovers (number VI) in the Major Arcana is one of the most symbol-rich and most misunderstood cards. Many people new to Tarot often reduce this card to romance between two people, but its meaning is broader and shifts depending on the layer of reading. This article separates four layers: Waite's original text from 1911, the modern reading, the Nhật Nguyệt understanding, and practical suggestions.
What is the historical origin of The Lovers card?
According to the popular short history of Tarot, the first decks appeared in Europe at the end of the 14th century through Italian seaports, and some surviving old decks were hand-painted for the Milanese nobility in the mid-15th century. At first, Tarot was only a game of the upper class, and the images on the cards depicted familiar allegorical stories. By the mid-18th century, some French occultists linked Tarot to ancient Egyptian wisdom, and the deck gradually took on divinatory and spiritual meanings. By the early 20th century, the Rider-Waite-Smith deck created by Arthur Edward Waite and the artist Pamela Colman Smith (printed in 1909) brought detailed illustrations to all 78 cards, helping readers grasp meanings through images. The divinatory meaning Waite published later in his 1911 book is a system of its own, often different from modern meanings.
The original text: how did Waite in 1911 describe The Lovers?
Waite writes in The Pictorial Key to the Tarot (1911) that: the sun shines in the height of heaven, below is a great winged figure with arms extended, pouring down influences. In the foreground are two human figures, a man and a woman, revealed to each other, as Adam and Eve when they had just entered the paradise of earthly bodies. Behind the man is the Tree of Life, bearing twelve fruits, and behind the woman is the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil; the serpent is coiled around that tree. Waite writes that these two figures suggest youth, virginity, innocence and love before it is soiled by gross material desire. He also writes that this, in all its simplicity, is the card of human love, presented as part of the way, the truth and the life; it replaces, by returning to first principles, the old card of marriage and the later images depicting a man standing between vice and virtue. Waite adds: in a very high sense, the card is a mystery of the Covenant and the Sabbath.
Waite also lists divinatory meanings for this card: Attraction, love, beauty, trials overcome. Reversed meaning: Failure, foolish designs. Another source that Waite cites speaks of marriage hindered and everything contrary. It should be noted that Waite gives contradictory meanings as well, and he does not attribute to the card any ability to predict the future.
According to how Tarot is read today, what does The Lovers mean?
According to how Tarot is read today, The Lovers upright is usually understood as connection, an important choice, and harmony. Reversed, this card is usually understood as imbalance in a relationship or a wrong choice. The accompanying keywords are connection, choice, harmony. This is the common meaning today, and it is also the meaning that the Nhật Nguyệt card-drawing tool uses, and it is not the divinatory meaning Waite gave in his 1911 book.
According to the Nhật Nguyệt understanding
According to the Nhật Nguyệt understanding, The Lovers is the card of conscious choice and the union of opposites. The image of Adam and Eve suggests the moment a person realises they can choose, and every choice carries responsibility with it. The card does not promise a fixed outcome, but invites the querent to look again at their core values before deciding.
Suggestions for today
A suggestion from Nhật Nguyệt: if you are weighing an important choice, write down two to three values you do not want to trade away, then check that choice against them. On matters of the heart, it is better to state clearly what you need rather than guess the other person's mind. At work, you might review a collaboration or a career decision that is leaving you hesitant. On money and health, the card offers no prediction; if worry persists, consult someone with expertise.
Quick reference table: The Lovers upright and reversed
| Aspect | Content |
|---|---|
| Deck | Major Arcana |
| Number | 6 |
| Main keywords | connection, choice, harmony |
| Meaning upright | Connection, an important choice, harmony. |
| Meaning reversed | Imbalance in a relationship, a wrong choice. |
Overview article on the topic: Tarot Basics: The 78 Cards And The Meanings Of The Major/Minor Arcana
