AUTHOR’S NOTE: I began reading Benebell Wen’s Holistic Tarot a while ago but soon gave up because I found that it departed too drastically from my long-standing Hermetic approach to the Major Arcana. But I recently realized that the passages I objected to were inspired by Chinese cosmology and not by the tenets of Western Mystery Tradition to which she eventually returned, so I went back to reading it and immediately encountered fascinating new insights about the High Priestess.

Wen notes that the scroll on the lap of the Waite-Smith High Priestess is inscribed with the word “Tora” in reference to the Judaic code of scriptural law. But she also mentions that in Japanese Tora means “tiger,” and she goes on to suggest that the placidly-seated High Priestess could be construed as a “crouching tiger.” This sent me off on an interesting tangent.

The High Priestess is generally viewed as signifying concealed wisdom that is symbolized by the veil behind her. In practical terms this is sometimes interpreted to mean knowledge that is being withheld from the seeker, or that the individual is not yet ready to receive. The priestess is therefore a gatekeeper who guards the sanctuary of premature enlightenment. She bespeaks an entirely passive state of non-disclosure, and there is an elusive quality to this card that can defy easy definition. But the “crouching tiger” metaphor tells a different tale.

Suppose the provocative secrets harbored by the High Priestess are being held in abeyance only until triggered by circumstances, at which time they will “pounce” on the querent, possibly at a most inopportune moment and from a completely unexpected angle. The lady is not idly languishing, she is poised to deliver a knockout blow and is just awaiting the signal! This is a far cry from the usual notion of exalted (and rather frigid) purity and fidelity in that she now becomes more a dispatcher of targeted revelation than a protector of the vault, and is therefore just a little dangerous in her conceits. The card suggests “What you don’t know can hurt you,” especially when the priestess is “throwing darts.”

When this card is reversed it could mean that the wisdom is “double-wrapped” in secrecy and even less attainable, or conversely that something or someone is about to carelessly “spill the beans” on an unpleasant revelation, making the impact even more uncomfortably onerous. Whether the card is upright or reversed, the remedy for its subtle intervention is to trust your instincts when alarms are going off in your subconscious. She may look harmless, but watch out for those teeth and claws!

I like the idea that the priestess is positioned to inform and not to perpetually keep us in the dark. However, she will still do it on her own terms, so I would look to the card(s) leading up to the High Priestess for the “spark” that stimulates her indulgence and examine the cards following to identify the vehicles of her dispensation. If she is seen as a purveyor of information, the subsequent cards show the contents of her message and the consequences of partaking thereof.

On another front, Wen makes a valuable comparison of the High Priestess to the Moon card, something I did myself a few years back. Hers doesn’t go quite as far as my own because it remains within the envelope of traditional esoteric canon, but it also doesn’t conflict with my theories about their proper roles and correspondences. If interested, you can find my essays under the Trump-card heading of the sidebar “Categories” drop-down menu.