Six of Cups – Tarot Card Meaning

Six of Cups

Fixed Water

Sun in Scorpio

Keywords: nostalgia, childhood, happy memories, balance, beginner’s mind, childlike wonder, beauty, cycles of Life and Death

Rider-Waite-Smith

In the RWS we see one child in a red hood handing a cup with a white flower to another child. They are surrounded by other cups with the same white flowers. The color scheme is the yellow of consciousness.

Overall, the card suggests feelings of nostalgia and happy childhood memories. It also suggests the same principle of balance and reciprocity we see in the Six of Pentacles.

Perhaps you have a memory of receiving a gift from a loved one. That feeling of pleasure upon unwrapping it is the essence of this card.

The emphasis on childhood and the white flower also suggests innocence and childlike wonder.

It represents the influence of our childhood upon our current life. It also symbolizes the balance of reflecting on the past and having a beginner’s mind as we move into the future.

Thoth – Pleasure

Six of Cups Thoth

 In the Thoth 6 of Cups, we see six beautiful, ornate cups in perfect balance and harmony over a gorgeous blue sea. Golden lilies are filling the cups but they are not overflowing, suggesting the balance of harmony appropriate to Tiphareth, the equilibrium of masculine and feminine energy. 

Crowley says, “Pleasure, in the title of this card, must be understood in its highest sense: it implies well-being, harmony of natural forces without effort or strain, ease, satisfaction. Foreign to the idea of the card is the gratification of natural or artificial desires. Yet it does represent emphatically the fulfillment of the sexual Will, as shown by the ruling Sephira, planet, element, and sign.”

Astrologically, the Six of Cups represents the Sun in the sign of Scorpio. As the symbol of putrefaction, Scorpio in this alignment is in its purest form: partaking in the Life process itself, the basis of all fertility being the natural cycles of life and death.

We see this in soil. Soil can only be created by the putrefaction of organic matter. The death of life is critical for the creation of Life. This balance of passive death and the active Sun represents the balance and harmony of the Six of Cups.

From Book T – The Lord of Pleasure

An Angelic Hand, as before, holds a group of stems of water-lilies or lotuses, from which six flowers bend, one over each cup. From these flowers a white glistening water flows into the cups as from a fountain, but they are not yet full. Above and below are Sun and Scorpio referring to the Decan. 

Commencement of steady increase, gain and pleasure; but commencement only. Also affront, detection, knowledge, and in some instances contention and strife arising from unwarranted self-assertion and vanity. Sometimes thankless and presumptuous; sometimes amiable and patient. According to dignity as usual. 

Tiphareth of HB:H (Beginning of wish, happiness, success, or enjoyment). 

Therein rule HB:NLKAL and HB:YYYAL. 

RETURN TO TAROT CARD MEANINGS

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