Pamela Colman Smith · RWS deck
The Minor Arcana
Ten of Cups
Malkuth in Briah
- Suit
- cups
- Rank
- Ten
- World
- Briah
- Station
- Malkuth
- Verb
- I create
Malkuth, manifestation under the exile
Malkuth is what has fully manifested. In the present age the axis between Tiphereth and Malkuth is fractured, so a Ten is not serene completion. It is what actually arrived, as against what recognition at the Six intended.
Upright
Flowing. The made world, complete: belonging in lived form, fulfilled and imperfect. In the world of creation, what the self made has become a place the self can live in, and the card shows the place with people in it.
Misdirected. The picture mistaken for the place, or display standing in for the life.
Reversed
Blocked. The made world does not come together, with no belonging in lived form.
Flooded. Everything made becomes the home, with no outside.
The image
A couple stand with their arms around each other beneath an arc of ten cups in the sky, like a rainbow. Two children dance beside them. A house, a river and trees spread out below.
Learn how to read Ten of Cups in a spread
This page shows you what Ten of Cups 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.
