Lenormand and Kabbalah

[Draft]
Beyond Lenormand, Chapter 6, Marcus Katz & Tali Goodwin
The Lenormand and Tarot Correspondences
In this chapter, we will provide a system of correspondence between Lenormand and Tarot,
based on the original Game of Hope, and A. E. Waite’s Christian mystical interpretation of
Tarot on the Tree of Life. This provides a system of correspondence which allows for the
Lenormand cards, in their context of Christian moral teaching, to be matched with any other
system, including Astrology, Numerology, Herbs, even ancient Egyptian deities. This process
of mapping challenges us to look at the deeper patterns in the universe, and how those
patterns arise in what may appear at first an arbitrary arrangement of symbols. In magick,
there are no coincidences – everything is seen as an exemplar of archetypal patterns.
We begin by comparing the Hechtel sequence of cards in the Game of Hope with its earliest‐
known predecessor, the Coffee Cards discovered by Mary K. Greer. These were viewed by us
in the British Museum and the instructions which came with the cards are published as The
English Lenormand. That booklet explains the differences in more detail.
Here is a table of comparison between Hechtel’s 1799/1800 deck, published by ourselves as
The Original Lenormand, which became “the” Lenormand, and the 1796 Coffee Cards
detailed in the Amusemens book.
1799/1800 (Hechtel) 1796 (Amusemens)
1. Rider/Messenger Roads
2. The Clover Leaf Ring
3. The Ship Leaf of Clover
4. The House Anchor
5. The Tree Serpent
6. The Clouds Letter
7. The Snake Coffin
8. The Coffin Star
9. The Bouquet Dog
10. The Scythe Lilly
11. The Rod/Whip Cross
12. The Birds/Owls Clouds
13. The Child/Little Girl Sun
14. The Fox Moon
15. The Bear Mountains
16. The Stars Tree
17. The Stork Child
18. The Dog Woman
19. The Tower Pedestrian (Man)
20. The Garden Rider
21. The Mountain Mouse
22. The Ways Rod
23. The Mice Rose/Carnation/Flower
24. The Heart Heart
25. The Ring Garden
© Marcus Katz & Tali Goodwin, 2013 www.beyondlenormand.com
[Draft] Beyond Lenormand, Chapter 6, Marcus Katz & Tali Goodwin
26. The Book Bird

27. The Letter Fish
28. The Gentleman Lion or any Ferocious Beast
29. The Lady Green Bush
30. The Lily Worms
31. The Sun House
32. The Moon Scythe
33. The Key
34. The Fish
35. The Anchor
36. The Cross
So we take the 32 cards of the Lenormand in sequence, as a didactic model of spiritual
progression, and apply them from the top of the Tree of Life downwards. This is
straightforward, as the Sephiroth 1‐10 are seen as “paths” and then we go down the 22
paths in the standard pattern.
We start at the “top” of the Tree, with Kether, applying the CROSS, because the final card is
given in the Game of Hope as the destination – although arriving at the Cross is not the
purpose of the Game. We’ll return to that later.
So this gives us 30 positions, as Hechtel condensed two pairs of cards; Serpent/Worms, and
Tree/Green Bush, which perhaps he thought may cause confusion in a game as being too
similar. He then added 2 extra cards (we guess, Fox and Stork using fables) to make up for
that conflation, and then made up the deck to 36 cards by adding 4 extra symbols (again,
guessing the specifics; Ship, Tower, Book and Key). All these are common to coffee‐grind
reading symbols from which the original coffee deck was derived. He certainly added these
6 symbols as cards, for whatever reason, to make the deck from 30 (having removed the
two similar symbols) to 36, so it could be used in other card games.
Following our structure, we place the conflated cards first onto the two final paths, to
ensure we use the 32 images of the original deck. That is, we place the Green Bush down on
path 31 and the Worms down on path 32. That completes our sequence neatly. The reason
we place them in that order is that it follows their order in the Coffee Cards, and it also
“makes sense” to have the Worms as the lowest and final path.
We then place the Book (Knowledge) in Da’ath (Knowledge) because that is an immediate
and obvious correspondence. In both systems, those concepts carry the identical attributes
of “(forbidden) knowledge”. In Hechtel’s Game of Hope, the book is actually a spellbook,
carrying a hex or curse, whereas in Kabbalah some occultists see Da’ath as a “forbidden
gateway” with the same sort of transgressive properties.
That just leaves five Hechtel cards to allocate (Ship, Fox, Stork, Tower, Key). These are the
“local” Nuremberg cards, in that they represent the Tower at Nuremberg, the Ship carries
the flag of Nuremberg, and the Fox and Stork are the fable cards (the various fables of
Reynard and the fable of the Stork and the Frog‐King). The Key is just the Key!

So far, this results in the following correspondences to the Sephiroth:
1. Kether: Cross
2. Chockmah: Anchor
3. Binah: FIsh
4. Chesed: Moon
5. Geburah: Sun
6. Tiphareth: Lilly
7. Netzach: Lady
8. Hod: Gentleman
9. Yesod: Letter
10. Malkuth: Ring
There is already an apparent and pleasing symmetry at work in this design. The Moon and
Sun become complementary, as do the Lady and Gentleman. The Moon is above the Lady
on the Tree, as the Sun is above the Gentleman. The Cross and the Circle (Ring) are now
placed at the top and bottom of the Tree. The pure Lilly is in the Centre, between the Sun,
Moon, Man and Woman. The Letter in Yesod communicates the entire Tree into Malkuth.
Furthermore, by correspondence, these cards can be seen as resonating with the numbered
cards in the Tarot, i.e. the Cross corresponds to the four Aces in Kether, and the Ring holds
together the four Tens in Malkuth. The sixes in Tarot are now the “Lilly” cards, showing pure
balance and harmony.

The correspondence to the Paths then follows in sequence:
11. Heart
12. Mice
13. Ways
14. Mountain
15. Garden
16. Dog
17. Stars
18. Bear (Wild Beast)
19. Child
20. Birds
21. Rod
22. Scythe
23. Bouquet/Rose/Flowers
24. Coffin
25. Serpent
26. Clouds
27. Tree
28. House
29. Clover
30. Rider
31. Green Bush (duplicate of Tree, removed by Hechtel)
32. Worms (duplicate of Serpent, removed by Hechtel)

We can look at these first in terms of their depiction of the interaction between the
Sephiroth, for example, the CHILD is the product of the relationship between Chesed and
Geburah. The CHILD can be seen then as representing the balance between love and anger,
mercy and discipline.
Another pictorial elucidation can be seen in the crossing of paths in the lower triad of the
Tree, where the Snake “hangs” on the Tree! In Kabbalah, the Serpent is seen as wrapped
upon the Tree of Life, leading us up to Knowledge. At a higher level, the Ways make their
way through the Mountains, on this arrangement.
There are many further pleasing patterns; the domesticated Dog is found on the opposite
side of the Tree to the wild Beasts (Bear). The Rider (movement/new) is opposite the House
(fixed/history) and there appear to be many more beautiful relationships and contrasts.
Having found this correspondence system, and seen that it holds some structure in terms of
Kabbalah, we can now overlay any other system, through correspondence. The first is
obviously to Tarot, although we can now go on to equate all the Lenormand cards as having
equivalents to astrology, numerology, herbs, deities and any other system.
[Illus to follow of Cards on Tree of Life Paths]
The Lenormand Cards and Tarot
There are a number of ways of allocating the Tarot to the Tree of Life, and we must choose
one in order to make a mapping. In this case, we choose A. E. Waite’s “secret” system,
revealed by ourselves after a century of secrecy, in our publication, “Abiding in the
Sanctuary”. We choose this system because Waite had many years of experience and
experimentation to devise the model, it is Christian Mysticism, the same background as the
original Game of Hope cards, and because we find it most appropriate in the context of
spiritual development – as different from magical development, the context of the Golden
Dawn system.
So we make the mapping, using the Tree as our structure, between the sequential
arrangement of the Coffee Cards and the arrangement made by Waite (who also, by the by,
knew about and wrote on these symbol of coffee grind reading).
The only technical trick here is to slightly re‐distribute the four cards that cross the Abyss,
and Da’ath, as Waite’s Tree of Life breaks down the paths across Da’ath, so does not have
the Golden Dawn type of arrangement, with, for example, a single path between Tiphareth
and Kether. We have highlighted these four cards in the table below.
11. Heart = Emperor
12. Mice = Empress
13. Ways = Fool
14. Mountain = Strength
15. Garden = Wheel
16. Dog = Magician
17. Stars = Chariot
18. Bear (Wild Beast) = High Priestess
19. Child = Last Judgment
20. Birds = Hermit
21. Rod = Hierophant
22. Scythe = Death
23. Bouquet/Rose/Flowers = Hanged Man
24. Coffin = Sun
25. Serpent = Temperance
26. Clouds = Devil
27. Tree = Lovers
28. House = Moon
29. Clover = Star
30. Rider = Justice
31. Green Bush = Blasted Tower
32. Worms = World
The Hechtel Cards on the Tree
We are then left with the five “extra” cards in the Game of Hope that are not in the Coffee
Cards, having allocated the Book to Da’ath. We allocate these by overlaying them at the
base of the Tree of Life, beneath the Veil. We feel that as these were “local” decisions made
by Hechtel or the publisher, we can see them as manifest/everyday symbols, hence the
bottom area of the Tree. We can group these images into the two fables and the two real‐
world objects, and the Key. We then balance those on the paths at the base of the Tree to
reveal this correspondence:
28. Tower (House = Moon)
29. Stork (Clover = Star)
30. Ship (Rider = Justice)
31. Fox (Green Bush = Blasted Tower)
32. Key (Worms = World)
This gives a pleasing symbolic symmetry to the Tree, as for example, the World (Tarot) now
corresponds not only to the Worms (mundane existence) but is also the Key, unlocking the
Book of Knowledge higher up the Middle Pillar in Da’ath.
In symbolic terms, the cultivation of the Green Bush turns into the manipulation of the Fox,
the Ship is another motile object like the Rider, whereas the Tower is fixed like the House.
The Stork is about return and navigation, as is the Star.
So we have a unique peculiarity with the Lenormand and Kabbalistic correspondences, in
that we have an overlay of five cards which represent higher/lower aspects of their Tarot
and Kabbalistic correspondences.
Those cards are also, it turns out, the basic elemental correspondences:
28. Tower = Earth
29. Stork = Air
30. Ship = Water
31. Fox = Fire
32. Key = Spirit
Using the Correspondences in a Reading
The simplest way of using correspondences is by mapping the cards by their resonance – the
correspondence version of “equation”. In correspondence there in no direct equaling of
symbols, i.e. the Rod is NOT the Hierophant, nor should we say “in this system, the Rod is
the Hierophant”. We can say they have a mutual resonance, a correspondence, only.
Having said that, if we do a 3‐card Majors‐only Tarot reading, we can map it across easily to
its Lenormand resonance, and read Lenormand as literal as we want. This gives a bridge
between the so‐called ‘abstract’ nature of Tarot and the so‐called ‘literal’ nature of
Lenormand – a concept we don’t actually see in practice, but some do.
Q. Tell me about the outcome of the business proposition?
Tarot Cards: The Sun + The Tower + The High Priestess
A. Whilst you may be shining, and considering growth, this could come to a sudden stop,
and be criticized in some way, leading to a more intuitive approach. You should consider
how fast you are growing, and perhaps go with your deeper feelings more. There is no
practical consideration here – it is entirely an emotional matter.
Now – we can correspond these cards directly to Lenormand in our system:
Lenormand Cards: Coffin + Fox (Green Bush) + Bear
If we were reading this in literal Lenormand, it would be “An end to your current situation,
leading to a cunning relationship with authority”. In fact, the tales of Reynard are full of the
fox’s dealings with the Bear, often tricking the slow‐moving animal in a variety of ways. The
Lenormand is telling the Sitter to make use of their faster‐moving individual way of doing
business (self‐employment) as well as taking advantage of the larger company or a person
of authority in that company (Bear). So we would advise not to sign everything away in a
contract, but retain some amount of self‐determination. If it were an author, we would be
saying, “go with the publisher, but retain the ability to self‐publish”, for example.
In this example, we can see a clear and easy method of mapping and getting the best out of
both the Tarot and the Lenormand.
We can also work the other way around, by turning a Lenormand reading into a Tarot
reading:
[More to follow here]
Using the Correspondences in Magical Practice
We can also now use the Lenormand cards in magical practice, by considering their
correspondence through this system to incense, deities, colors, and other aspects of ritual.
We can use any dictionary or index of correspondences, such as Crowley’s “777” which is
also available online.
If we wanted to blend incense for healing, we can simply conduct a 3‐card Lenormand
reading, and then look up the three incenses corresponding to those cards.
The Man + The Letter + The Mice
This would correspond with Hod (Sephirah) + Yesod (Sephirah) + Path 12 (between Kether
and Binah, corresponding to the Empress in Tarot using Waite’s Christian mystical system).
We look up the incenses of these Sephiroth in 777 and discover they are:
Storax + Jasmine + Mastic/White Sandalwood
That is actually a really interesting and appropriate set of perfumes for healing. As Crowley
says, for path 12, all “fugitive odors” are fitting. Whilst the resultant incense blend might
smell like “jasmine mothballs”, it would be highly likely to be appropriate for this healing
work.
Using the Correspondences with Other Systems
Using the Lenormand Cards as a Spiritual Map

Lenormand and Kabbalah

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[Draft]

26. The Book Bird

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