This page is about the ‘official’ Order Tarot deck called Egyptian Tarot. In every true act of divination, in every true act of magick, something of the soul is born into the world. The soul has a tenuous relation with the mind, and cannot do without that relation; the very existence of the soul depends on it. The soul is latent until she brings forth her ‘child’, by which she restores the world to the divine image—which is called a Great Work. It is through such subtle relations that the soul realises the principle by which it is possible to resurrect the whole (integral) individual.
The Guidebook focuses on the structure of the Tarot and the Qabalistic correspondences that transform it from a card game or fortune telling device into a vehicle of the highest order. The major arcana cards each have a chapter to describe them; a complete method of divination is provided.
The Egyptian Tarot and Guidebook may be ordered from Crossed Crow Books and is on general release since 1st October 2025 to retailers and bookshops world wide.
Why did we create the Egyptian Tarot?
The Egyptian Tarot was not in any way designed to appeal to someone looking for a quick start-up in the business of telling fortunes for fun and profit, or that aims to launch a career as a professional psychic. That much will become evident to anyone that reads the Guidebook that accompanies the Tarot. So what is the Egyptian Tarot all about and who is it for? We can look now at the roots of all that holds the Egyptian Tarot together in its modern context.
Order of the Golden Dawn
1. The Order of the Golden Dawn and all related offshoots and lineages is the foremost modern point of contact. The most influential Tarot of all time was doubtlessly the Rider-Waite or Waite and Coleman-Smith deck as it came to be known. Waite was a member of the Golden Dawn and he used their correspondence system to create the design with the artist. This was the first serious modern deck.
2. Aleister Crowley also used the Golden Dawn correspondences, with a few adjustments, to make his ultra-modernist and very personalised Thoth deck with Frieda Harris.
3. Our Egyptian Tarot uses the same Golden Dawn system of correspondences, and is very much part of that same historical line. Use was made of the special interpretation of the colour correspondences used by fine artist and Surrealist painter Ithell Colquhoun, who was a member of the Golden Dawn and several other occult organisations through her life. We wrote an article on her recent big exhibition in England a while ago: Surrealism and the Occult.
Anyone involved in Golden Dawn derived or related organisations can make good use of the Egyptian Tarot; these have the best chance of understanding and using it in the way that was intended. They might even discover that it will increase knowledge, is perfect for ritual and meditation and is one of the best means of practice with divination to give satisfactory answers to either spiritual or mundane questions.
Egyptian Tarot and Law of Thelema
There are certain references in style and symbolism that will be very familiar to those who have studied the Law of Thelema. For example, the four Princes are styled on the high priest and scribe Ankh-af-na-khonsu depicted on the Theban Stele of Revealing that was ‘discovered’ by Crowley in 1904 in the Museum of Cairo, and which is to many around the world a major icon and source of inspiration. Atu IV Hrumachis is styled on the god Horus, Ra Hoor Khuit or Mentu as he appears on the same stēlē. The figure of Nuit XVII, the trump for Aquarius, is also styled on the beautiful depiction of Nuit at the top of the Theban Stele of Revealing.
When we first made the Tarot, before Crossed Crow Books took it up, it was called Egyptian Tarot of Thelema. That linked it to the Aleister Crowley and Frieda Harris Thoth deck, and Crowley’s works in general. Our original motivation for going to so much trouble in the first place was to make an alternative to Crowley’s deck. Why do that? For years we had campaigned, and wrote many books along the way, to establish the Law of Thelema as a spiritual path independent of the writing and thought of Crowley and his followers. For a few examples one might consider the following books:
Ritual Magick—Initiation of the Star and Snake
Babalon Unveiled! Thelemic Monographs
Law of Thelema—Hidden Alchemy
Some, having gained only incorrect information about Thelema that does not amount to knowledge, might say, ‘But isn’t Thelema the invention of Crowley?’ It is hardly the case. In the context of Liber AL, the Book of the Law that is the source text, and by numeration, the word Thelema can be taken to mean ‘will’ and ‘love’ as two things that are one in reality.[1] This renders the Law of Thelema as capable of interpretation along the lines of very ancient Tantric theory and practice, especially where Shiva as the supreme principle is expressed as divine will and the cosmic power of the same is Shakti. Instead of appealing to Western philosophers, whose works are actually attacked in the Book of the Law as owing to the ‘dogs of reason’, we can understand the source text with traditional knowledge or āgama as it is called in Sanskrit. This has been the basis of much of our work extending over many years. There is no need at all to study the works of Crowley and his epigones. In fact we recommend that our students do not waste their time with that.
When the package of Egyptian Tarot and Guidebook went to the very capable hands of Crossed Crow Books for further (extensive) editing and final publication we removed the ‘Thelema’ tag as by that time we had come to the conlusion it is impossible to remove the Law of Thelema from close identification with modernist notions, which include the total inversion (and so subversion) of all traditional symbolism. Certainly, some fine practices have been presented in our book publications and an interpretation of the Law of Thelema that is actually workable, but as these are all available to the public others can make use of them without our help. Our spiritual work is by now very specialised and it suits our purposes to work privately with a small group of practitioners.
The Egyptian Tarot was created to bring light into this world, not to obscure or obfuscate the truth. All seekers of true knowledge can benefit from study and practice with the ancient images and the theoretical basis supplied in the Egyptian Tarot and Guidebook.
In creating the Egyptian Tarot, we have made full use of Ithell Colquhoun’s ingenious interpretation of the Golden Dawn colour correspondences.
Read more...
Colquhoun, when explaining her Tarot, or TARO, eschewed the notion of divination. Her abstract Surrealist Tarot was designed purely as a yantra for meditation. As ours is a figurative and symbolic Tarot, it lends itself to meditation, ritual or divination. From the book:
The well-known occult association between the Tarot cards and ancient Egypt is by now commonly dismissed. This is because we live in a time where materialism now dominates the minds of the majority to such an extent that they no longer even think of themselves as materialists. All such arguments, based on ‘evidence’ and ‘fact’, miss the mark. It is irrelevant as to whether or not the ancient Egyptians might have used anything like playing cards or Tarot, whether for amusement, fortune telling or divination. The key to the knowledge is in the symbolism, which, even in the first deck printed from woodcuts, the Tarot of Marseille (late 15th or 16th century), is astonishing. Once it is known that Egypt was the source of all learning and civilisation, there is no longer any need to speculate on the origins of the Tarot. We are not speaking here of artefacts, we are speaking of symbolism that points to a timeless wisdom. This owes to a source far older than that even of the 1st Dynasty of Egypt.
Our book insists upon the following: “A word must be heard before it can be uttered.” Technically, and especially from the yogic point of view, hearing and speech are closely related. Space is filled with akasha or ether, which is perceptible through vibration, forming the basis of both sound and light. The Intelligible Light is one expression used by the ancients to denote the divine light, which consciousness may make comprehensible. Symbolism, of which the Tarot is a notable example, is a needful support to spiritual realisation.
The twelve zodiacal Egyptian Tarot card designs have a page each on our website. The designs can be enlarged by clicking on the images:
Aries (Equinox) Hrumachis IV
Taurus Hathoor V
Gemini Shenut VI
Cancer (Solstice) Atet VII
Leo Sekhet XI
Virgo Isis IX
Libra (Equinox) Ma’at VIII
Scorpio Sokar XIII
Sagittarius Neith XIV
Capricorn (Solstice) Set XV
Aquarius Nuit XVII
Pisces Khonsu XVIII
Read a review of this book and Tarot by Robin Fennelly from Philadelphia:
Musing Mystical: Egyptian Tarot
Notes
1. Greek Will (Θελημα) and spiritual Love (Αγαπη) both add to 93.
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