The Tower: tarot meaning, upright and reversed

Lightning strikes a crowned tower as figures fall and sparks scatter through the dark.

Upright

rupture · exposure

An unstable arrangement is being exposed or broken. Respond to what the disruption makes unmistakable.

Reversed

delayed rupture · contained upheaval

A feared break may be postponed or experienced inwardly; the underlying fault still needs attention.

In a reading

The position gives this card a particular task: a description of the situation, a challenge, or guidance. Read its image and meaning alongside the other cards and the question that brought them together.

Golden Dawn correspondence

Planet: Mars. This is the attribution in Book T.

Sources

A. E. Waite, The Pictorial Key to the Tarot. These notes are original interpretations of the Waite–Smith imagery, informed by that text.