3/11 The Emperor #4

TEMPLE artefact #24

#4 The EMPEROR final version, art by Rian Hughes

IV. THE EMPEROR

KEY WORDS – DISCIPLINE, RULES, AUTHORITY, LEADERSHIP

THE EMPEROR is the complementary card to the EMPRESS, and here we see the subject of her sidelong glance. When placed with Empress on left and Emperor on right they balance and acknowledge one another.

The Emperor represents material power and authority. It is the card of the Patriarchy featuring the archetypal father figure. It can also represent repressive totalitarian energies of the kind currently oppressing the world.

The EMPEROR is a powerful self-assured, successful white man (Musk meets Bezos meets young Trump) wearing a tailored RED SUIT. A dark red Steve Jobs poloneck. The top half of his body is contained in a triangle composition. His right knee crossed over the left to suggest a relaxed insouciance that’s reminiscent of the Devil’s pose in His Infernal Majesty’s card. This pose forms a hidden triangle with cross below, the alchemical symbol of sulphur, the fiery masculine energy of Rajas, as depicted on the Wheel card,

He’s looking to his right with the subtle, satisfied, even smug, smile of success and when we line him up with the Empress card, their gazes meet – and a power couple is revealed!

Where the colours of the Empress were blues and greens, the Emperor is all reds and oranges. Green being the female colour of Venus, red the masculine hue of Mars.

The Emperor wears a CROWN fashioned from some of the world’s iconic skyscrapers, symbols of wealth and progress – the centre spike is the Burj – around it we see Trump Tower, the Empire State building, the Burj El Arab, the Shard etc. On the brow there is a circle divided into four by a CROSS.

Around his neck he wears a gold chain with a medallion upon which is engraved the Hebrew letter TZADDI (a hook).

In his right hand, where the traditional Emperor holds a sceptre or ankh, our Master of the World holds a SPACEX rocket. And in his left hand, palm upward in his lap, where the trad imperial dude holds a globe, ours holds a globe of MARS. Mars is the planetary designation for this card, so the fit is too good to overlook.

He sits in a throne with HIMALAYAN RAM’S HEADS on the supports at either side – two in profile at the top of the backrest supports, two more facing us from the armrests. The back of the chair rises in the shape of a cumulus cloud in a comic. On this ‘thought balloon’ shape we see little figures of stars, bees, and fleurs de lys.

The astrological attribution for this card being ARIES. The head on our left is BLACK, the one on our right is WHITE.

Behind, we see a horizon of mountain peaks.

At the top of the card, the lower half of a stylized sun enters the composition with rays spreading down in a fan of light.