The Tower card in the William Blake Tarot stands as both a sight to behold and a revelation to invite within, offering profound insights into the nature of divine intervention and personal transformation. As major arcana #16, it represents a moment when the universe itself steps in to redirect our path.
The numerology of the Tower reveals deeper layers of meaning through its components: 1 + 6. The number 1 represents the ego, the magician, the individual will – that self-asserting force filled with intention, for better or worse. The six embodies harmony in creative process, a sacred meeting point where 3 (the number of creativity) encounters itself, creating a space where divine harmonization can unfold.
When we understand this numerological dance, we see how our own will and the direction it has taken us creates an opening for divine interjection. The universe steps in on our behalf, delivering exactly what we need to better harmonize the structures of our lives, even if that delivery comes through disruption.
The traditional imagery of the Tower card often shows a literal tower, standing as a powerful symbol of human achievement – our constructions, our reaching toward the heavens, our carefully built hierarchies. The divine intervention that strikes this tower serves as an ego check, compelling us to reevaluate what we value, how we relate to life and others, and our concepts of order and authority.
In these depictions, we often see lightning or fire – forces of instant transformation that change everything in the blink of an eye, irreversibly altering our landscape of understanding. But it’s the specific artistry of the William Blake Tarot that offers perhaps the most beautiful lesson about this card. Here, we see a white frame surrounding the darker-toned card within a larger frame – a perfect metaphor for the importance of perspective in how we perceive and respond to life’s tower moments.
When we encounter what I lovingly call a “Tower Moment,” we have a choice in how we frame it. We can ask ourselves – or the creator, consciousness, God, the all-that-is – what this event might be doing for us. How might it be helping us harmonize? What new structures might it be clearing the way for? When we approach these moments with such questions, the answers we receive can rock our world in the most transformative ways.
The Tower offers profound teachings about surrender and liberation. It reminds us that allowing higher order to take control opens the path to card #17, the Star – the card of wishes and dreams manifested. This is the breakdown that precedes breakthrough, but only if we can allow that cosmic hip-check to our ego to teach us flexibility rather than rigidity.
If we resist this lesson in flexibility, we risk falling backward to card #15, the Devil, allowing our limited perspective to rule us rather than expanding into new understanding. Yet there’s no judgment in this process – all experiences have their place in the world, serving as teachers and healers, creating spaces for both suffering and transcendent love.
The true gift of the Tower lies in its invitation to step back from our immediate experience and view our circumstances through an optimistically curious lens. When we accept this invitation, we can transmute the rubble of our tower moments into foundation stones for new creation, working in partnership with the divine architect who sees and considers far more than we can imagine.
In this way, the Tower becomes not just a card of destruction, but a gateway to reconstruction – an opportunity to build something more aligned with our highest good, guided by the wisdom of divine timing and cosmic understanding.
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