Pamela Colman Smith · RWS deck
The Minor Arcana
Ten of Swords
Malkuth in Yetzirah
- Suit
- swords
- Rank
- Ten
- World
- Yetzirah
- Station
- Malkuth
- Verb
- I connect
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. An account carried to its end: what is finished, finally, and nothing more can be done in that mode. In the world of mental formation, a story has played out completely, and the card says so without softening it.
Misdirected. Replaying the ending, or mistaking exhaustion for finality.
Reversed
Blocked. The ending cannot complete and will not finish.
Flooded. Endings everywhere, all at once.
The image
A figure lies face down with ten swords along his back, beneath a black sky. A thin gold light shows on the horizon over calm water. It is the least ambiguous picture in the deck about an ending, and the one that shows most plainly that the morning is still coming.
Learn how to read Ten of Swords in a spread
This page shows you what Ten 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.
