The Biblical Cheat Codes Hidden in Your Tarot Cards

When most people picture tarot, they imagine moody fortune tellers, Renaissance fair enthusiasts, or that one friend who refuses to text back because Mercury is in retrograde. But pull out a standard Rider-Waite-Smith deck and you aren't looking at rogue pagan rebellion—you’re looking at Sunday school with better art direction.
 
When Christian mystic Arthur Edward Waite and artist Pamela Colman Smith designed the iconic deck in 1909, they were steeped in esoteric Christian tradition. Whether they drew from deliberate study, sub-conscious cultural habit, or channeled archetypes floating through the collective ether, the visual echoes are unmistakable.
 
Here is how some of the Major Arcana’s biggest hits were quietly borrowed straight from scripture.

1. Temperance: The Angel of Revelation

​Temperance (XIV) looks like a serene figure practicing mindful water-pouring, but its entire spatial layout is lifted directly from the Book of Revelation:

​"Then I saw another mighty angel coming down from heaven... He set his right foot on the sea and his left foot on the land..." — Revelation 10:1–2
 
John of Patmos described a cosmic herald of the apocalypse standing with one foot on land and one in the sea. Waite took that exact posture, added a glowing solar emblem on the forehead, and rebranded the apocalyptic herald into an alchemical poster child for balance. Less "fire and brimstone," more "moderation is key."

2. The High Priestess: Old Testament Architectural Digest

​Sitting on her stone throne, The High Priestess (II) poses between two large, imposing pillars marked B and J.
 
These aren't her initials. They stand for Boaz and Jachin, the two famous bronze pillars guarding the entrance to King Solomon’s Temple (1 Kings 7:21). Boaz means "in strength" and Jachin means "he establishes." To make the Sunday school connection entirely undeniable, the scroll resting in her lap is labeled TORA—a subtle-as-a-sledgehammer reference to the Hebrew Torah.

3. The Lovers & The Devil: The Ultimate "Before and After" Photo

​Place The Lovers (VI) and The Devil (XV) side by side, and you’ll realize you're looking at the ultimate "How It Started vs. How It's Going" meme, straight out of Genesis.

• The Lovers shows Adam and Eve vibing in paradise under the Archangel Raphael. Behind Eve is the Tree of Knowledge (snake included); behind Adam is the Tree of Life, lit up with twelve flames.

 

• The Devil is the disastrous sequel: The Fall of Man (Genesis 3). Adam and Eve appear in the exact same positions, except now they’ve sprouted horns, grown tails, and wear loose chains around their necks attached to a demonic pedestal. It’s a literal graphic novel depicting what happens when temptation wins.

4. The Tower: Genesis 11, but Make It Dramatic

The Tower (XVI) features a golden-crowned spire built on a mountain peak getting utterly wrecked by divine lightning while panic-stricken human beings fall to the earth.
 
This isn't just bad luck; it’s a direct visual recount of the Tower of Babel (Genesis 11:1–9), where humanity tried to build a skyscraper to heaven to prove how great they were, only for God to pull the plug on their project. Tarot keeps the exact same plot point: a quick, fiery reminder that hubris builds lousy foundations.

5. Judgement: The Horn Blows

There is no poetic subtext here; Judgement (XX) is just straight-up biblical fan art of the Last Judgment.
 
You have Archangel Gabriel floating in the clouds, blowing a golden trumpet flying a red cross flag—a direct visual translation of 1 Thessalonians 4:16 ("For the Lord himself will come down from heaven... with the trumpet call of God") and Revelation 20:12–13. Below, people literally pop out of open graves to step into the afterlife.

6. The World: Ezekiel’s Vision Meets the Gospel Crew

In the four corners of The World (XXI)—and echoed on The Wheel of Fortune (X)—sit four winged entities: an Angel, an Eagle, a Lion, and an Ox.
 
These four characters are pulled straight from the prophet Ezekiel’s trip-inducing vision of the throne of God (Ezekiel 1:10) and the heavenly worship scene in Revelation 4:6–8 (known as the Tetramorph). Christian art history has used these four creatures as the symbols for the Gospel writers for centuries:

• Matthew: The Winged Man
• Mark: The Winged Lion
• Luke: The Winged Ox
• John: The Flying Eagle

The Abrahamic Overlap: What About Islam?

If these motifs sound surprisingly familiar to anyone who grew up reading Islamic text, you aren't imagining things. Because Judaism, Christianity, and Islam share the same Abrahamic root stock, the tarot's scriptural DNA translates easily into Quranic narratives.

• The Lovers and The Devil echo the Quranic account of Adam and Hawwa (Eve) in the Garden, tempted by Iblis (Satan) into spiritual bondage (Surah Al-A'raf 7:19–27).

 

• The High Priestess sits before Solomon’s Temple—a monument to Prophet Sulaiman, revered in Islam for his divine wisdom, command over jinn, and grand sanctuary (Surah Saba 34:12–13).

 

• Judgement visually recreates the blowing of the Trumpet (Sur) on Day of Resurrection (Yawm al-Qiyamah), where Archangel Israfil signals the dead rising from their graves to face divine justice (Surah Az-Zumar 39:68).

 
While orthodox Islamic theology strictly forbids using cards for divination (kahanah), the visual imagery itself is a shared inheritance—proving that the symbols driving these cards are core archetypes of the entire Abrahamic world.

​Whether you view tarot as a spiritual mirror, a psychological self-reflection tool, or just pretty cardboard, its visual language speaks fluent Abrahamic scripture. By piggybacking on centuries of creation, apocalyptic drama, and divine judgment, the cards didn't reinvent the wheel—they just put a fresh coat of mystic paint on ancient Western and Middle Eastern holy texts.