Knight of Swords
Fire of Air
The Lord of the Winds and of the Breezes; the King of the Spirits of Air
Rider-Waite: King of Swords
Fire of Air: the storm wind, mind as attack, fast, fierce and exact.
| Formula | Fire of Air: Knight is Fire, Swords are Air |
|---|---|
| Mix | Friendly elements that feed each other |
| Letters | Yod of Vau (the Name, YHVH) |
| Sephirah | Chokmah, sphere of the Knights |
| Arc | 21° Taurus to 20° Gemini |
| Dates | May 11 – Jun 10 |
| Rules | Seven of Disks (Failure), Eight of Swords (Interference), Nine of Swords (Cruelty) |
| I Ching | Hexagram 32, Hêng, Duration (Thunder over Wind) |
| Rider-Waite | King of Swords |
In a reading
Active, clever, subtle, fierce, delicate, courageous, skilful in attack; a person who thinks by striking. Badly placed: deceitful, tyrannical, crafty, inclined to overreach and to abandon what he began.
Working with the card
| As a person | A sharp, active, domineering mind: brilliant in attack, impatient with doubt. |
|---|---|
| As a situation | A fast-moving conflict or decision that rewards decisiveness. |
| Advice | Decide and move; subtlety can come later. |
| Do | Go straight at the problem and cut through. |
| Bring | Skill, courage, speed of thought. |
| Beware | Aggression without reflection; the tyranny of the clever. |
| Ask | What needs to be cut right now? |
Correspondences
- Knight Yod, Fire
- Swords Vau, Air
- Fire of Air rank of suit
- Chokmah sphere of the Knights
- Atziluth the world of emanation
- 21° Taurus to 20° Gemini May 11 – Jun 10
- ♉︎Taurus
- ♊︎Gemini
- Taurus III Seven of Disks
- Gemini I Eight of Swords
- Gemini II Nine of Swords
- Hexagram 32 Hêng, Duration (Thunder over Wind)
- Air colour element
On the card
A knight in yellow armour charges through the sky on a horse, a sword in one hand and a dagger in the other; his helmet bears a whirling four-bladed crest and swallows fly beside him.
Kabbalah and astrology
The Yod of the Vau: Fire of Air, the wind become storm, thought at its most violent and swift. He rules the last decan of Taurus (the Seven of Disks) and the first two of Gemini (the Eight and Nine of Swords). Crowley's hexagram, 32, Duration, is thunder over wind: persistent force in a changing medium, which is also the card's weakness.
Rules Seven of Disks (Taurus III, Saturn), Eight of Swords (Gemini I, Jupiter), Nine of Swords (Gemini II, Mars). The courts of the twelve arcs each take the last decan of one sign and the first two of the next, so that every court contains a hidden tension between two signs.
I Ching
Crowley builds each court's hexagram from two trigrams, the suit below and the rank above: Swords give Wind, Knights give Thunder. The result is hexagram 32, Hêng, Duration (Thunder over Wind). See I Ching and the courts.
Depth psychology
Thinking in its most fiery, extraverted form: the mind as a weapon. As an inner figure, the animus as attacker of every settled position. The four ranks are often read as the four ways the suit's function can be lived: the Knight extraverted and initiating, the Queen introverted and sustaining, the Prince as its intellectual form, the Princess as its embodied form.
Thoth and Rider-Waite
This card corresponds to the Rider-Waite King of Swords. Crowley renamed the ranks to follow the letters of the Name: Knight (Yod), Queen (Heh), Prince (Vau), Princess (final Heh), so that the Thoth Knight is the Waite King and the Thoth Prince the Waite Knight. The figures' mounts follow the Golden Dawn: Knights on horses, Queens on thrones, Princes in chariots, Princesses on foot.
The two signs
Taurus (“I have”): patience, loyalty, sensuality, steadiness, practical skill, love of beauty. Shadow: stubbornness, possessiveness, laziness, materialism, resistance to change.
Gemini (“I think”): curiosity, wit, communication, versatility, youthfulness. Shadow: superficiality, inconsistency, gossip, nervous scatter, two-facedness.
The card holds the last ten degrees of Taurus and the first twenty of Gemini, so its character is mostly Gemini with a trace of the sign before. Anyone born May 11 – Jun 10 has this as their court card. Find a birthday.
Related cards
Cards ruled
- ♄︎Seven of Disks FailureTaurus III, May 11–20
- ♃︎Eight of Swords InterferenceGemini I, May 21–31
- ♂︎Nine of Swords CrueltyGemini II, Jun 1–10
Trumps of Taurus and Gemini
The other Knights
- ♏︎Knight of Wands Fire of FireFire of Fire
- ♒︎Knight of Cups Fire of WaterFire of Water
- ♌︎Knight of Disks Fire of EarthFire of Earth
The court of Swords
Correspondences follow the Golden Dawn system as used in Crowley's Book of Thoth and Liber 777. Paintings by Lady Frieda Harris, © Ordo Templi Orientis. Where sources differ.