Eight of Swords

Two long swords are crossed by six small weapons of different oriental kinds, each blocking the others; the sky is criss-crossed.

Hod, Splendour, in Yetzirah, the world of formation. Splendour, the sphere of Mercury: intellect, language, science, form without force. Hod is the mirror of Netzach on the other pillar. The Eights are Hod in the four worlds and show the element organised, sometimes overorganised, by mind.

Hod in the world of Air: mind organising mind, and the organisation gets in its own way. Jupiter in the first decan of Gemini expands where the sign would divide.

Jupiter in the first decan of Gemini (0°–10°, about May 21–31). Jupiter is expansion, generosity, luck, law and the king's mercy. On the Tree it is Chesed; among the trumps it is Fortune, the wheel that turns by its own law.

Gemini is mutable Air: the twins, the mind that sees two of everything, speech and exchange. Mercury rules it. Its trump is the Lovers. The trump of Gemini is The Lovers.

This decan is ruled by the Knight of Swords, whose arc runs from 21° Taurus to 20° Gemini. The two Shem angels of the decan are Iezalel and Mebahel.

Thought: intellect, analysis, the mind organising what feeling has produced. Hod, Splendour. The Eights show the element ordered by mind; Adjustment is trump VIII.

Thinking obstructed by its own machinery; the mind lost in its instruments. The Swords are usually read as the thinking function in Jung's typology, an interpretive convention rather than a text of Jung's.

Rider-Waite calls the suit Swords. Its small cards carry scenes; the Thoth small cards carry the suit emblems arranged geometrically, with the keyword printed at the bottom and the colours of their Sephirah and decan. The Golden Dawn title (Lord of Shortened Force) is shared by both traditions.