The Four of Cups stands for grace on the creative level of human expression. Four of Cups upright: responsibility. Four of Cups reversed: irresponsibility.
The Two of Cups formulates creative ideas. The Three of Cups defines the context and audience that establishes a creative undertaking. The Four of Cups supports the undertaking with its benevolent influence. Hence the title Potential.
The results of desires and creativity are experiences, so, you can think of the power of the Four of Cups as the source of the inexhaustible wealth of life experiences.
On the creative-feely level, grace supplies us with everything we need for our creative pursuits. The corresponding affirmation is, “From the exhaustless riches, I draw all things needful, both spiritual and material”. The respective power of consciousness is measurement. Grace gives us exactly what we need and that at the right time. Well, sometimes it gives us more than we can chew. More about this in a moment.
If we measure a thing properly, it becomes benevolent. If there is too little of it, it is useless. If there is too much of it, it becomes harmful. Anything turns into poison if we use too much of it. And if we dose poison properly, it becomes medicine.
Creative benevolence means measuring and aligning the interest of the creator and her audience.
Remember that the Three of Cups establishes an audience? Creative measurement establishes win-win situations. It’s not difficult to create with compassion and social conscience. To find a win-win, ask yourself who could profit from your creation.
If we create with conscience, we will help societies improve. This has a healing influence on our stricken planet, too. Some corporations have understood this already. They decrease their carbon footprint and/or donate a percentage of their revenues to planting trees.
Simplified, there are two types of business attitudes. The first banks on the power of benevolence, for example, harnessed through Feng Shui. This promotes a slow, organic expansion. The second banks on competition, manipulation, and rule-bending to force unwarranted growth.
As mentioned, on the creative-feely level, we are dealing with forms of imagination. The Four of Cups calls for formulating visions of abundant supply, love, joy, and compassion, instead of engaging in negative imagery like lack, sorrow, and negative expectations.
If the Four of Cups turns up auspicious during a Tarot reading, it may indicate that the querent is receptive to grace. A sure indicator of that is if the person is grateful. Mind that being comes before having. If we want to be loved, we need to become a lover first. If we want grace, we need to become graceful first.
An inauspicious Four of Cups may indicate that the querent is tempted to justify means with ends to further her undertaking.
It may also mean the opposite: excessive benevolence, which leads to indulgence and leniency. When we bestow too much benevolence on someone we love, we spoil that person. When people get too lucky, they may rely on their luck instead of walking the walk.
Last but not least, an inauspicious Four of Cups may mean that the querent has reached a point of boredom with consumerism and dissatisfaction with material success, and that she longs for purpose. Creativity offers purpose.
Four of Cups Symbolism
The four cups in the picture assumed an orderly arrangement.
Their distances are measured, and they form a rectangle, which suggests order.
Two of the cups look upward, which symbolizes receptivity to grace. Two look downward, which signifies aim.
Potential results from being receptive to grace. We still need to make use of grace and take our undertaking through the rest of the Creative Tree, as well as through the Intellectual and Bodily Tree.
The Five Psychological Core Meanings of the Four of Cups
We derive the psychological meanings of Tarot cards from their position on the Tree of Life.
In the Enlightenment Tarot framework, the Four of Cups represents Chesed of Netzach, i.e., grace on the creative-feely level of human expression.
Every Tarot card represents a faculty or power of consciousness. We can use faculties of consciousness constructively and destructively, which produces either a fortunate or an adverse state of mind. Hence, every Tarot card has five core meanings.
These are the five core meanings of the Four of Cups:
- Power of consciousness: Measuring, weighing, quantifying
- Constructive use: Responsibility
- Destructive use: Irresponsibility
- Favorable internal experience: Growth, increase
- Adverse internal experience: Inertia
Reflective Questions
If the Four of Cups appears in your spread, you may want to ask yourself the following reflective questions:
- Am I grateful for the graceful influence in my life or am I fuzzing over the things I don’t have?
- Am I visualizing abundance and love, or am I fixating on a sense of lack?
- Am I looking for win-win situation in all aspects of my life?
- In which people do I indulge and how does that affect my relationship with them?
- In which areas of my life am I bored and/or disillusioned with material success? What do I want to do about it?
Four of Cups Summary
The Four of Cups invites us to embrace grace, measure our actions wisely, and use our imagination to create an abundant and purposeful life.
Where Do Tarot Card Meanings Actually Come From?
The meanings of Tarot cards come from various sources. The most common are:
- The position of the Tarot cards on the Tree of Life
- Astrological correspondences (signs, planets, & houses)
- The symbolism of Tarot cards
- Intuition
- Meanings that pertain to fortune-telling
Most of the Tarot card meanings you can google are astrological correspondences and go back to the Golden Dawn and Arthur Edward Waite. Astrological meanings dominate at present because Astrology is a divination tool and favors fortune-telling. But these meanings are unsuitable for (psychological) Tarot readings.
If you are interested in an overview of the astrological correspondences, you can download a high-resolution chart by subscribing to the Enlightenment Tarot.
Tarot card meanings are a bit of a mess since the meanings that pertain to their position on the Tree of Life are mixed up with astrological correspondences, symbolic interpretations, and fortune-telling connotations. That’s tedious to memorize. Further, tarotists’ opinions, knowledge, and linguistic backgrounds shaped some of these interpretations. Last but not least, many meanings are fuzzy, contradictory, and overlap. If you want to understand why they overlap, read the article How to Deal With the Overlapping Meanings of Tarot cards.
The meanings of the Enlightenment Tarot are based on an objective, holistic framework: the Tree of Life and the four levels of human expression. The resulting meanings are transparent and logical, and hence, easier to memorize.
What do Various Tarotists Say about the Meaning of the Four of Cups
Let’s explore what different tarotists wrote about the Four of Cups.
Usually, tarotists consider the astrological significance of Tarot cards. The Four of Cups represents the third decanate of Cancer, ruled by the Moon and subruled by Pisces and Jupiter.
This blends Cancer’s motherly-protective vibes with the occult, benevolent, and sacrificing Pisces characteristics, which produces a sympathetic, courteous, and ceremonious disposition.
It also combines the rulership of the house of home (Cancer) and the house of help (Pisces).
What Paul Foster Case Said About the Meanings of the Four of Cups
For the Four of Cups, Paul Foster Case offered the keyword surfeit, which denotes abundance and grace.
The inauspicious meanings of this card is over-satiety — too much material grace. Paul explained that this is a card of contemplation and the turning away from pleasure in the quest of higher things. The querent may be successful in material things but dissatisfied with this success. This card also indicates a sense of confinement, even if these are wealthy life circumstances. When the power of the Four of Cups makes itself felt, millionaires sell their Ferraris and go to India to live in Ashrams.
There are two types of lifestyles available to us: the reactive-competitive lifestyle and the creative lifestyle. Most people pursue a reactive-competitive lifestyle, which limits them to the intellectual and bodily levels of human expression. There comes a day when we are fed up with this life-style, however successful we are. Then, we yearn for an active-creative lifestyle that allows us to pursue our heart’s desire. Mind that the path of the Wheel of Fortune/Cycles leads to the Four of Cups, which has the epithet the intelligence of desirous quest. This is the path of the heart’s desire. If we take that path, we will realize what true fortune is.
Paul mentioned that an inauspicious Four of Cups can also indicate material gain but through injustice, sorrow resulting from satisfaction of desires, and getting what one wants but finding no joy in it.
What Arthur Edward Waite Said About the Meanings of the Four of Cups
Arthur Edward Waite offers the meanings of contrarieties and presentiment.
Presentiment or premonition points at Pisces, which is the most psychic zodiac.
Arthur offered the auspicious meanings of blended pleasure, which hints at an overabundance of grace. He adds the meanings of novelty, new instruction, and new relations. These meanings pertain to (creative) potential.
Arthur wrote that this card can indicate imaginary vexations, as if the wine of this world had caused satiety only. Grace offers the wastrel in the picture another wine as a fairy gift, but he sees no consolation in it. The wastrel is a victim of materialistic grace. But it also hints at the turning point Paul mentioned, the moving away from a materialistic inclination to a creative disposition.
Arthur’s inauspicious meanings of weariness, disgust, and aversion add to this picture.
What Etteilla Said About the Meaning of the Four of Cups
Etteilla, a French occultist and the first known professional tarotist, offers the meanings of boredom and misfortune.
Boredom hints at the dissatisfaction with materialism. The meaning of misfortune is too general and pertains to fortune telling.
What Papus Said About the Meaning of the Four of Cups
Papus, another French occultist and the founder of the Martinist Order, offers the meanings of serious obstacles from others.
He derived this meaning from the House of Help, ruled by Pisces, which governs limitations, restraints, and hidden enemies.
What Gregor Mather Said About the Meaning of the Four of Cups
Gregor Mather, the founder of the Golden Dawn, claims that an auspicious Four of Cups signifies boredom, displeasure, discontent, and dissatisfaction, which concurs with the mentioned concept of being fed up with consumerism.
On the positive side, this card shall fortell a new acquaintance and signify guesswork, signs, and presentiment. We already covered presentiment and signs.
New acquaintance pertains to fortune telling, so, no comment. How Gregor arrived at the meaning of guesswork is unclear. Maybe he thought that guesswork is an inauspicious exercise of premonition.
The Psychological Framework of the Enlightenment Tarot
Every Tarot card represents a faculty of consciousness. We can use a faculty of consciousness constructively and destructively. This produces favorable and adverse experiences.
We can express faculties of consciousness on four levels:
- The spiritual level (wands/fire/intention)
- The creative-feely level (cups/water/imagination)
- The intellectual level (swords/air/intelligence)
- The bodily level (pentacles/earth/bodily action)
The four tools on the magician’s table symbolize these four levels:
- The wand (spiritual)
- The cup (creative-feely)
- The sword (intellectual)
- The pentagram (bodily)
These tools correspond to the four so-called elements: fire, water, air, and earth.
For this reason, the Enlightenment Tarot wands are made of fire, the cups consist of water, and the pents are composed of earth. Unfortunately, it’s impossible to illustrate something made of air, since air is invisible. For that reason, all swords are made of crystal to show at least transparency.
The Enlightenment Tarot derives its meaning from the Tree of Life and the four levels of human expression. This is an objective, holistic framework that reveals the psychological imports of Tarot cards and their faculties of consciousness. Read more about this framework in the article The Psychological Framework of the Enlightenment Tarot.
The Enlightenment Tarot project attempts to rediscover the original meanings of the Tarot cards that pertain to their position on the Tree of Life. These meanings are simple, clear, and easy to memorize.
*This framework is compatible with Paul Foster Case’s qabalistic system.
Do you want to Learn more About The Enlightenment Tarot?
If you want to delve deep into the psychological meanings of Tarot cards, read the book Tarot of Life.
If you are curious about how the Enlightenment Tarot came about, read this article.
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If you are looking for a psychological Tarot deck, you have come to the right place. The Enlightenment Tarot derives the cards’ meanings from a holistic and transparent framework that is easy to learn and memorize. All major and minor arcana carry psychological titles, and the court cards display psychological profiles. Have a look at the Enlightenment Tarot deck here.
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