Tarot Books & Primary Texts
The esoteric tarot — symbolism, divination, and the Tree of Life.
The tarot began as a set of playing cards in fifteenth-century Italy and was reinterpreted, from the eighteenth century onward, as a repository of hidden wisdom. Esoteric writers linked its twenty-two trumps to the Hebrew alphabet and the paths of the Kabbalistic Tree of Life, making the deck a map of the soul’s journey.
The two decks that define the modern esoteric tarot — the Rider-Waite-Smith and Crowley’s Thoth — each came with a foundational book. These works remain the essential guides to the cards’ symbolism and their use in meditation and divination.
Essential Texts
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A. E. Waite’s Pictorial Key to the Tarot is the standard introduction and companion to the world’s most popular deck. Crowley’s Book of Thoth is deeper and more demanding.