JudgementTarot card meaning
Judgement is card 20 of the Major Arcana. In tarot it means awakening, reckoning and the call. As a yes or no answer, it leans yes.
Something is calling you to rise, a purpose, a verdict on the past, a second act. Judgement asks you to answer honestly for what has been, and then, freed of it, to stand up.
In a yes or no reading: Yes · yes or no tarot →
- Arcana
- Major Arcana
- Astrology
- Fire
- Number
- 20 · 20 → 2
What the card shows
An angel leans out of the clouds and sounds a trumpet with a white banner and a red cross. Below, coffins float on a wide sea, and the people inside them are standing up with open arms: men, women, children, all rising at the same call. Nobody is being judged from outside. They are answering something they recognize.
Judgement reversed
The call has come more than once and gone unanswered. Reversed, Judgement names self-doubt dressed as prudence, the review of your past that never ends because ending it would demand a change.
How to read a reversed card →Judgement in love
In love, Judgement is the call you can no longer ignore: the person from the past who writes again, the conversation still pending, the decision to forgive or to leave for good. The figures rise from their coffins with open arms. The card says something in your love life is standing up, and answering beats pretending not to hear.
Is Judgement a yes or a no?
Judgement answers yes, and the yes sounds like the angel's trumpet: it is a call, not a prize. The figures rise from their coffins with open arms. What you ask requires you to stand up and answer something you already heard. If it is what you have been putting off for a while, the answer is yes, now.
Judgement and its neighbours in the arc
| Card | Keyword | Element | Yes or no |
|---|---|---|---|
| The Sun | joy | Major Arcana | Yes |
| Judgement | awakening | Major Arcana | Yes |
| The World | completion | Major Arcana | Yes |
| The Magician | will | Major Arcana | Yes |
Cards that often appear with it
- The Sun
The card before it in the major arc
- The World
The card after it in the major arc
- The Magician
Its mirror from the other end of the arc
- Ace of Wands
The ace that speaks its element at street level
Number and correspondence
In the deck's old correspondences, Judgement belongs to Fire.
Will this card find you tonight?
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