On Tarot L, as part of another thread, a member posts about a recent survey on a Tarot forum that asks what are the most important Tarot decks for the serious student? See the full response at Back to Tarot – and back futher.

Our poster notes that there was a consensus in the results torwards three decks: Marseille, Rider Waite, and Thoth. He found this result to be both “shocking and unsurprising” (his words). He found the results to be unsurprising in that these are three of the most popular decks.

My response is . . . I thought you said the question was which decks were “must have” for the so-called serious student. That could mean which decks are considered to be most valuable for reading or which you like but to me it implies which decks are more important for the scholar. That’s not quite the same as as what is more popular.

The shocking part is because these are not new decks but older, more traditional ones.

Therein lay the rub . . . they are influential decks. Each of those influenced what came after. So, they are “important” to the serious student of Tarot in that they have inspired or influenced so much. This does not mean that they are popular in that folks prefer to use them. Personally, I have all three of those decks and about eighty others (physical decks, lord knows how many “virtual” or “digital” decks I have) and there are three or four decks from my collection that I tend to use . . . a couple more than any other (the deck I use most, when I’m “serious” about using a deck, is my Animation Tarot which is just a bunch of index cards with the name of the card written on it and no illustration using the scheme that Piers Anthony setup for his one hundred card deck, there is no commercially published deck so I just use index cards with the number, name, and symbol written on the card and it works fine until someone produces a beautiful and hot and sexy deck for that scheme . . . for other purposes when working with other people I tend to use the Meyers Art Nouveau Tarot and the Universal variation of the Waite and the Evan Show Lunatic Tarot decks more than any others with smatterings of the Tarot of the Ages and the Erotic Tarot thrown in – most of my other decks are appreciated but less likely to be used, and I didn’t purchase them specifically to be used but for other reason, historical, curiouisty, playfulness, importance, but I do like looking at the pretty pictures).

Our correspondent then asks the question as to whether or not we really do need any more decks if they aren’t really needed.

If they aren’t “needed” then NO we don’t “need” them . . . but that’s not really what the survey results should imply. These are the three that would come up as being most influential but that doesn’t mean something new and breathtaking isn’t just around the corner. There were a lot of Tarot decks prior to Waite and Crowley long after Marseille but it seems that those two decks and the philosophical interpretations and illustrative breakthroughs they represent really captured the imagination. There is always potential for something new and innovative to stil come.

He asks whether or not the Tarot world would be a better place if we only had those three influential decks.

My response? No.

He is, of course, speaking of hypothetically in that the world does indeed have thousands of decks with more being published every year. However, do we really need them all?

No, we don’t need them . . . and some of the decks I have and certainly many many more that are published probably would have been better off not seeing the light of day as they are often just bad decks, bad ideas, and bad art . . . but . . . there are also some innovative, creative, cool, and beautiful decks out there.

Saying we should only use Marseille, Waite, or Crowley and NOTHING else to me smacks too much of trying to turn pieces of paper into carved stone. These are indeed important decks but they don’t resonate for everyone. There are folks who do indeed use those decks – or, more likely, one of those decks – exclusively. Personally, I would not use the Marseille and I find the Crowley doesn’t resonate with me as nicely as the Waite . . . but, that’s me. For those who do use one deck exclusively, that’s their choice and their practice.

One could also say that there shouldn’t be ANY published decks. Perhaps we should all be required to illustrate our own personal decks . . . either following a model and coloring . . . or being required to create the whole thing just to make it more personal. Anyone who has seen my stick figure drawings knows that might be a very bad idea.

Don’t read more into an online poll than is there . . . albeit, I would agree those are the big ones in terms of historical influence or movements.

All the best,
Brian