The Hermit card is about integrity and the refinement of one's inner truth. It follows naturally after the Strength card. Once you embrace and flow with the powerful energy of your own animal passions and ego projections, you are invited to gradually draw that energy inward towards a place of truth. The picture on the card shows an elderly being alone holding a lantern, a beacon to light the way. This card is particularly about shifting the energy of the ego towards inner truth rather than outer recognition. The Hermit is not necessarily about being alone. But it is about cultivating your own light regardless of how others' perceive you. The inner light of the Hermit shines primarily for himself and not for others. It doesn't matter if other people agree with you if you know your own truth.
In Vedic astrology, the Hermit card corresponds with the zodiac sign of Virgo. Virgo is a mutable earth sign ruled by the planet Mercury. Remember that Mercury is the Magician card, the place where you initiate yourself into the tarot journey by stating your intent. The Magician is card number one while the Hermit is card number nine, and so the Hermit shows a degree of culmination or fruition of the intent that was begun in the Magician card. Mercury is a planet of bridging earth and sky. Virgo is especially concerned with turning your sky thoughts into earthly manifestation. In this way, Virgo is about the practical functioning of the body, and so it is a card of facilitating healing through medicines and an understanding of physical systems.
In my understanding of the Toltec path, this is the second card in the mastery of transformation. The Hermit takes the wild and unruly energy of the Strength card and draws it inward, towards inner truth. The Toltec concept of impeccability is crucial to this card. Once you understand the inclinations of the ego and the animal passions of your emotional body, you can shift that energy towards self-knowledge and self-actualization. Impeccability means not going against yourself. You may have a strong desire that wants to be fulfilled. The Hermit honors the truth of that desire without allowing the energy to be applied in a direction that will ultimately be harmful or go against your true nature. By drawing the perceptual energy of our ego fixations inward we allow for transformation to occur. If we remain fixated on the outer world of appearances and worldly acquisitions, we lose the energy needed to transform our consciousness.
The Hermit gives us the opportunity to go inward with intent and focus on our inner truth. It shows us how to refine our habitual actions and ways of seeing so that we conserve energy rather than lose energy. Most of all, it invites us to be impeccable with our words and actions. The Hermit can be about physical healing facilitated by paying attention to these miraculous physical vessels that are our bodies. Doctors take an oath that states above all they will do no harm. You may not know how to transform your life or even what you want to change, but nevertheless you can take an oath of impeccability. You can intend to do no harm to yourself or others.
Find the Hermit card in the deck of your choice and place it somewhere you will see it, on an altar or by your bed or workplace. Invite the Hermit into your life. Ask the Hermit to teach you about conserving energy, being impeccable, and finding your inner truth, and see what happens.
Next: Fortune
(c) 2004 by David Ray
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