The Celtic Knowledge Spread

Comment:

First off I haven't used the Celtic Cross as outlined above - by putting card 3 at the top - since the early days of my tarot studies back in the 1970's and 1980's.  Something always seemed wrong about the spread as outlined above.  Going back and forth and cutting across the spread seemed 'very wrong' to me.  I realize that this is the older 'accepted' method as detailed by countless writers for decades but it just felt wrong to me.

Sorry, this is just haphazard, confusing, disruptive and idiotic.  Plus cutting across the spread disrupts any type of possible harmony in the spread.  The only thing that makes sense doing it this way is going from card #6 to card #7 which the old timers had right.  Just because something has been done one way for decades doesn't mean it's the best, or even the correct way of doing it.  I have even seen Card #5 and Card #6 above switched making things worse as you end up cutting across the entire spread to get from card #6 to card #7.

This in turn just disrupts the symmetry and harmony of the spread even more.  This is confusing and my mind rejected it and thus I never even bothered with the Celtic Cross spread.  At the time I didn't realize why I had rejected the spread but I know now.  My mind just would not accept the disjointedness of the spread.

So when I took Joan Bunning's online course the first time I was extremely upset and dejected that she was using the Celtic Cross spread but decided to go ahead and keep taking the course anyway because I love the insights you often get from people new to the tarot.  With fresh, new eyes they have no preconceived ideas and often come up with the most delightful insights into the tarot.

Then one day I realized the lady (Joan Bunning) had the Celtic Cross .... WRONG!

But then I looked at it ... really looked at it and realized the lady had the spread RIGHT!  The old way was wrong and this version was RIGHT.  It really struck a cord with me and things just fell together like the pieces of a mental puzzle I hadn't been able to discern before.  With this next graphic you have to be a total moron, or a very closed off person intuitively not to see and realize what I'm talking about.

It has both beauty and symmetry and gets you from point A to point B WITHOUT taking a circuitous route or criss-crossing the rest of the spread.  The Root Cause (the word root suggests below/beneath - as in the roots of a tree) is below the seeker (card #3) where it belongs showing where and what is causing the seeker to have a false or shaky foundation and not above them where there should be a card of future/goals/hope and not have hovering over their head a card that usually denotes the Root Cause of their problem and is ... more often than not a card of stress.  Looking up the seeker would see no way out of her/his situation.  And looking up usually indicates that a person is seeking or asking for help from some devine spirit/entity.  If they look up and see the Root Cause of their problem then chances are they will ask themselves, "Why Bother?".

Thus I don't use the Celtic Cross but the Celtic Circle.  Which makes more sense to me personally and has both beauty, symmetry, and a clockwise smoothness that the old CC layout didn't have.  Except for one thing.  And what you may ask is this problem I see in the perfect symmetry of the newer Celtic Circle?

The position meaning for card #7 is in the wrong place.  This is the position of 'SELF'.

Rachel Pollack in her book, '78 Degrees of Wisdom', says, 'this does not refer to the whole person, but to some way in which the person her or himself is contributing to the situation'.  Which makes almost no sense to me the way she has it written simply because it is written badly.  Pollack goes on to say;

"What attitudes does the subject show?  What is she or he doing that will affect the situation described in the other cards?"

Joan Bunning, a lady I respect a great deal simply because she an excellent writer as opposed to Pollack who is a hack (and long winded to boot) gives the following as meanings for position #7.

• YOU AS YOU ARE
• YOU AS YOU COULD BE
• YOU AS YOU PRESENT YOURSELF
• YOU AS YOU SEE YOURSELF

Which I agree with but I have an easier, and to me more insightful meaning for position #7.

• The seekers current 'Mental and Emotional State'!

So why is it in the wrong place?

How can you possibly do a reading for a person when their current mental and emotional state doesn't show up until you get to card #7 ?  By then - many people are so confused because of the rest of the cards that came before card #7 that any type of significance for this position and the card that shows up is almost meaningless.  It throws you off that the spread suddenly wants to know what the person, the Seekers SELF is all about when this should have come eariler in the spread in my opinion.

But it does make sense as the bottom card of the Staff section of the CC spread considering how it's put together and if we try moving it to eariler in the spread it disrupts the symmetry of the spread because you have to shift all the other cards to where the 'Root Cause' would not be below where I think it should go.  Also the 'Opposing Factor' card at position #2 would no longer be crossing card #1 - 'The Heart of the Matter'.

So I have been telling people for awhile to start the reading of the CC spread with card #7 then go to card #1.  But there is another way if you would like to give it a try.  I call this the Celtic Knowledge Spread but it's just the CC spread done a little differently.

Check out the following graphic image.

This puts the 'Opposing Factor' at position number 5 which in numerology is probably the most stressful of numbers.

If you put the CK spread into the 3 sections given in the image above it should make things easier as far as trying to read the spread.

Start by reading just the first 3 cards.
1.) Self
2.) How others see you
3.) Hopes and fears

Then read the basis of the question and the situation(s) that are causing the seeker problems.
4.) Heart of the Matter
5.) Opposing Factor(s)
6.) Root Cause
7.) Past

Then see what you can do about it or what the future might bring.
8.) Possible Outcome, Goals and Purpose
9.) Future
10.) Final Outcome

Try reading the three (3) different sections elementally.

Just another in a long line of teaching aids, {grin}.

You might want to set out the The Celtic Knowledge Spread like in the image below as it has a cleaner look and a bit better symmetry in my opinion.

Revised from when originally done and different from the above graphic layout.

Here is some good practice on using both the CK Spread and reading the court cards since so many came up.

Date: 11-2-2002
Deck: Robin Wood
Spread: Celtic Knowledge

Question: General Reading (for me)

The Person
1.) 4 of Cups                  (Water)
2.) King of Swords          (Air)
3.) Justice                      (Air)

The Problem
4.) Knight of Wands        (Fire)
5.) Judgment                  (Water)
6.) 5 of Wands               (Fire)
7.) 5 of Pentacles           (Earth)

The Possibilities
  8.) 3 of Pentacles         (Earth)
  9.) Knight of Pentacles (Earth)
10.) Page of Swords       (Air)

This is a perfect distribution of elements by the way for a 10-card spread (3, 3, 2, 2).

2-Fire
3-Earth
3-Air
2-Water

The PCM (Pips,Courts,Majors) is a fairly good distribution too but a mite heavy on Court cards.  I like to see a distribution of 6 pips, 2 courts, and 2-majors.

Pips-4
Courts-4
Majors-2

Give it a shot and see what you come up with.

Don S.