I won’t deny that I totally identify with this Tarot card. (You may have noticed that my online identity is cdsmiller17.) The digits added together equal 8, the upright version of the Infinity symbol.
The card also represents Aquarius, my birth sign.
All-in-all, this fits me to a tee.
So, just for the sake of clarity, I am going to quote extensively from the book that accompanies this deck of cards.
XVII – The Stars
A large and bright eight-pointed star shines in the sky, surrounded by seven smaller ones; one seven are the mysterious numbers of this card. A completely naked maiden dominates the picture. With her right hand, she pours an essence from a jug into a stream; with her other hand, she pours something else onto the ground. We’ll look more closely at the meaning of these gestures later, but now we must remember a fundamental part of the scenery: the tree. It was in the older versions of the card, but we can’t see it here, as our position has changed.
The Soul of the Universe
A bird representing “The Garden of the Soul” was perched on the tree in the background, suggesting a place where existence or ideas, before coming into the world, are suspended between being and not being. The bird, in fact, in ancient mythology and biblical symbolism, represents both intelligence as well as the soul.
The maiden near the stream, therefore, can be defined as the Soul of the Universe, pictured at the moment she regenerates life by pouring the celestial essence on the ground and into the water.
The Star of Love
The eight-pointed star drawn on the ground, along with the flaming torch in its center, suggests the immortality of life and the spiritual regeneration that comes in cycles — a virtue of superior Grace. A star identical to this one exists in the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, marking the spot where Jesus was born. In its center shines an everlasting candle.
The eight-pointed star is also the hieroglyphic for Ishtar, or Venus, the goddess of love in Mesopotamian mythology, who appears in different guises in the myths of many people. One of these is Siduri, the young maiden who, in Gilgamesh’s epic, guards the Garden of the Gods. When she meets the hero, who seeks immortality, Siduri explains to him that when the gods created men, they decided their destiny was death. As a result, it’s important to enjoy the good things in life: dancing, feasting, loving one’s wife, having children. This is what the goddess said, but in this “Garden of the Stars” there’s more. The stars represent the gifts of the sky, expressed in the seven Liberal Arts, in the seven Virtues, and in the psychic qualities symbolized by the seven planets.
A Wanderer among the Stars
The pilgrim we see in the background is the Gnostic, searching for answers to life’s questions. The maiden represents the naked truth he’s looking for, as well as that he might not (and might not want to) see: enjoyment, love, procreating — the essence of common existence. This is suggested by the anagram of the number XVII; rearranged, the Roman numerals form a Latin word: VIXI, “I have lived”.
The sense of life, though, for the Gnostic, demands more than satisfying physical pleasures. His mind needs superior truths: secrets from the stars, the symbols of human character; powers from stone, herbs and metals, and all species of animals.
The stars are also the expression of every person’s inner qualities, which everyone needs to learn how to distinguish, in order to know oneself. The Gnostic knows that, for those who know how to recognize the harmony that balances being against not being, the Garden of the Gods is here, on Earth.
Main Meanings
There are good chances of success. You can expect a creative and satisfying time ahead in every part of your life. You must put your ideas down on paper and make the most of favorable premonitions. Thanks to someone’s advice, a dark phase will come to an end. Goodness and kindness will be the key[s] to this problem.
