The Death Card Three Ways

The  Tarot  Rebels  Blog  Hop takes a look at the 13th card in the Major Arcana - The Death Card.

The Death Card is one of the better known Tarot cards, even for those who have never had a reading or seen the deck. For years the so-called entertainment industry has used the trope of a tarot reading showing the Death card just before someone dies. And while this is certainly possible, the main focus of the card is how people react to Death and the changes it brings. 

Death is a certainty, and we all know it will happen to us and those we love. What we don't know is when, how, and what happens after Death. What we seldom come to grips with, until a death affects us personally, is how we understand Death and how we feel about it. 

These three cards show different ways of approaching Death. Is one of them the way you look at the end of life and what may lie beyond?

The card on the left is from the Steampunk Tarot by Barbara Moore and Aly Fell. In this interpretation the "spectre" of Death is a sad woman, riding away from the man laying flowers on a grave.  It shows the sorrow of Death from both sides of the veil.  

As we mourn the people who have left us, do they not mourn their separation as well?  What a comforting thought to know that our loved ones are watching us and wishing that they could still be a part of our lives. For many people this is very real.

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The center card is from Tarot of the Vampires of the Eternal Night by Barbara Moore and David Corsi. It depicts a figure sitting in a chair contemplating what has just happened and trying to come to an understanding.  

Will Death be a time of mourning and sadness, and unwillingness to accept what is? Or will it be seen as a transition that brings about a new beginning instead of a final ending? This question has been unanswerable for the living for many centuries. Maybe contemplation after death is what we need in order to decide which path is right for us.

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The card on the right is from the Tarot of Pagan Cats by Magdelina Messina and Lola Airaghi. Here we see Death in a black cat, sitting on a grave as if to keep the body buried. There is no malice in the cat's eyes, only the inscrutable gaze that so many people find disconcerting to look at. Death is portrayed as a simple event in this card, and there is a finality to the image that seems to say that there is nothing more to come. No one mourning, no contemplation by the recently departed, nothing more than a final resting place.  

This idea of death seems to be the one that scares people the most and drives us to find the answers to what happens to us after we die.But as soon as we think there is nothing in the card to give us hope, we remember that a cat has nine lives. The subtle message is that there may be more to come - a new beginning. 

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Whatever you may think of Death and what comes after the end of the physical body, you will never know for sure until it happens to you.  How you deal with the ideas about death and continuing past that point help to determine how you choose to live your life.  Do you fear a life after death or embrace it? Will you live your life without worrying about the inevitable or will you live scared by the ending that we all face?  These are hard questions to answer, but they deserve some thought. Don't leave the contemplation until after you are gone!