Pamela Colman Smith · RWS deck
The Minor Arcana
Eight of Swords
Hod in Yetzirah
- Suit
- swords
- Rank
- Eight
- World
- Yetzirah
- Station
- Hod
- Verb
- I connect
Hod, what is named and ordered
Hod is splendour: the faculty that articulates, orders and names. The Eights are the weakest rank in the fit audit, and the entries say where the picture does not help.
Upright
Flowing. Thought ordered into a complete account: its clarity shows where you are, and its edges are where it can be revised. In the world of mental formation, the account is useful because it is finished, and the card keeps asking where the ropes are loose.
Misdirected. Taking the account for the situation, so that it binds.
Reversed
Blocked. The account cannot be made, because thought will not order.
Flooded. Too many accounts, each binding, over-explaining.
The image
A woman stands blindfolded and loosely bound in shallow water, ringed by eight swords planted upright in the ground. A castle stands on a rock behind her. The picture fits the station only partly. It shows an account that binds, and less of how it was put in order.
Learn how to read Eight of Swords in a spread
This page shows you what Eight of Swords means. Knowing how to read it — how it shifts next to the other cards, what the reversal is really telling you, and how to turn a spread into a clear answer — is what the RWS Decoded course and book teach, card by card.
