Major Arcana · 9
The Hermit
L'Ermite · Il Eremita · The Wise Old Man
The The Hermit tarot card meaning runs through both orientations: upright, solitude, introspection, guidance; reversed, isolation, loneliness, withdrawal that has become hiding. Below, its imagery across the Rider–Waite–Smith, Thoth, and Marseille decks, and what the tradition’s writers said about it.
- Element
- Earth
- Planet
- Mercury
- Zodiac
- Virgo
- Hebrew
- Yod
- Numerology
- 9
- Timing
- Virgo season (August–September); the longer arc — months; the dark phase of the moon; winter retreat.
Upright
- solitude
- introspection
- guidance
- inner light
- wisdom through withdrawal
- the lantern
Reversed
- isolation
- loneliness
- withdrawal that has become hiding
- rejection of guidance
The Hermit Tarot Card Meaning
Upright
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Reversed
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The image, three ways
Rider–Waite–Smith
A robed elder stands alone on a snowy mountain peak, holding a lantern containing a six-pointed star. He leans on a staff, head bowed in contemplation.
Thoth
An ancient cloaked figure holding the lamp of the Hermit, a serpent at his feet, surrounded by stylized seeds — the Hermit as the Yod, the cosmic spermatozoon and the seed of new being.
Marseille
L'Ermite — a stooped old man holds a lantern in front of him with one hand, a staff in the other. The lantern is sometimes shielded, sometimes shining.
Four ways a reversal speaks
After Mary K. Greer, Tarot Reversals (2002)
01 · excessive
Solitude that has crossed into hiding; the cave become a coffin.
02 · shadow
The recluse who calls avoidance wisdom; spiritual snobbery.
03 · blocked
The lantern unlit; refusing the inward turn the soul is asking for.
04 · denied
Wisdom refused; the older voice ignored because attending to it would require change.
What the tradition says
A.E. Waite · 1910
The Pictorial Key to the Tarot
Prudence, also and especially treason, dissimulation, corruption, roguery; circumspection. Waite's reading is more cautious than romantic.
Aleister Crowley · 1944
The Book of Thoth
The Hermit as Yod — the seed of all manifestation, the spermatozoon of the cosmos. Solitude as cosmic generative principle.
Rachel Pollack · 1980
Seventy-Eight Degrees of Wisdom
The Hermit is the moment when the journey turns inward — having achieved the worldly mastery of the first eight cards, the seeker now seeks the source.
Mary K. Greer · 1984
Tarot for Your Self
Greer instructs the Hermit's querent to cancel something on their calendar — to literally make the room for the inward turn the card is asking for. The Hermit cannot be merely thought about; he requires actual solitude to be honored.
Robert M. Place · 2005
The Tarot: History, Symbolism, and Divination
Place traces the Hermit to the medieval Father Time figure — the old man with the hourglass — and notes how the Renaissance occult tradition replaced timekeeping with truth-keeping. The lantern is the image of inner illumination not as escape from time but as the gift time gives the patient.
Shadow
The recluse who has confused avoidance with wisdom; the spiritual snob who can't tolerate ordinary company; the lonely person calling loneliness depth.
Archetypal role
The Sage / The Mystic / The Wise Old Man / The Lantern-Bearer
Historical notes
The Hermit was originally Il Tempo (Time) in some early decks, depicted as an old man with an hourglass — Father Time. The lantern replaced the hourglass during the Renaissance esoteric reinterpretation. Crowley emphasized the Yod — the Hebrew letter that is the seed of all letters and the secret name of God's spark in matter.
Neighbouring arcana
The Hermit combinations
Bring this card into a question
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