My biggest recommendation is the book 78 Degrees of Wisdom by Rachel Pollack. She compares the imagery off of the most popular symbolic systems for tarot, and really dives in to the esoteric meaning of each symbol. If you can absorb her book, you will be able to read nearly any deck you come across on sight alone.
For the Thoth tarot specifically, I would recommend Understanding Aleister Crowley’s Thoth Tarot by Lon Milo DuQuette. The Thoth deck is a slightly more advanced deck in my opinion, but it ties tarot philosophy to Kabbalah, Jungian psychology, and a whole lot more.
I started as a Rider Waite deck reader (which is the most common symbol set in tarot), and Rachel Pollack’s book is perfect for understanding that, but then I moved into the Thoth deck as I got more advanced and understood what a genius Crowley was with this kind of stuff. There is no right or wrong answer—use the deck that speaks to you—but I’d recommend starting off with a standard Rider Waite and seeing where the journey takes you.
WeirdGoesPro@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 month ago
As a matter of fact, yes.
My biggest recommendation is the book 78 Degrees of Wisdom by Rachel Pollack. She compares the imagery off of the most popular symbolic systems for tarot, and really dives in to the esoteric meaning of each symbol. If you can absorb her book, you will be able to read nearly any deck you come across on sight alone.
For the Thoth tarot specifically, I would recommend Understanding Aleister Crowley’s Thoth Tarot by Lon Milo DuQuette. The Thoth deck is a slightly more advanced deck in my opinion, but it ties tarot philosophy to Kabbalah, Jungian psychology, and a whole lot more.
I started as a Rider Waite deck reader (which is the most common symbol set in tarot), and Rachel Pollack’s book is perfect for understanding that, but then I moved into the Thoth deck as I got more advanced and understood what a genius Crowley was with this kind of stuff. There is no right or wrong answer—use the deck that speaks to you—but I’d recommend starting off with a standard Rider Waite and seeing where the journey takes you.