I’m an I Ching aficionado and also a tarot aficionado, wrote chonky books on both subjects, so naturally I’ve thought long and hard about how the two systems reconcile. This page is a download of a tarot and I Ching correspondence table for your easy go-to referencing.

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The first three landscape-view pages print on Legal size paper (8.5″ x 14″), and it’s that first chart image snapshot you see above. I like how you can see the Kabbalistic, astrological, archetypal, and also the I Ching trigram correspondences all in one glance with the table.

Preemptive Note: One of the columns that has primarily astrological correspondences per the Golden Dawn attributions is vaguely titled “Metaphysical Correspondence” because it’s not all astrological and I couldn’t come up with a good enough descriptive label, so I just slapped on the random “Metaphysical Correspondence” to that column. Shrug. In any case you can download the editable MS Word version of it and revise the words on this document any way you like.

The subsequent two pages print also print at Legal size (8.5″ x 14″), but via vertical orientation rather than landscape. This section is a distilled short-form summary of the longer treatment in my book I Ching, The Oracle explaining my correspondence system and rationale, which in turn reconciles with the Kabbalistic correspondences with the tarot.

This approach to correspondences connects the dots in a super compelling way. And most importantly, it works.

However, it probably requires a little bit of set-up and explaining, if you truly care about following and understanding the logic all the way through. So that’s what these next two US Letter size pages in the download help to do, and if you want the full-scope version, that’s in my book, I Ching, The Oracle, Chapter 7 (Divination Methods), “I Ching and the Tarot.”

In short summary, instead of forcing 64 hexagrams into 78 arcana, we started the function by reducing to common denominators: aligning the elementals.

For the Minors, when we say “Fire-Yang set” or “Water-Yin set,” here’s what we mean:

“Fire-Yang” means the Kings, Knights, and odd numbers from an Active suit. Wands is an Active suit. So the Kings, Knights, and odd numbers from the suit of Wands (Active) correspond with the trigram Fire.

“Water-Yin” means it’s from the Passive Suits column, because we see that Water is a Passive suit. Yin refers to the Kings, Knights, and odd numbers when in a Passive suit, such as the Cups. Therefore Kings, Knights, and odd numbers from the suit of Cups (Passive) correspond with Water.

The two color-coded tables above work in tandem with each other.

Structurally, we now have 8 trigrams each assigned to 9 cards in the tarot (8 x 9) for a total of 72 cards corresponding with the 8 trigrams, creating an 8 x 9 symmetry that mirrors the 72-fold sacred numerology found in Kabbalistic, Solomonic, and Western esoteric traditions. In also mirrors Taoist metaphysics, namely through the 72 astrological deities (24 solar terms of the Chinese lunisolar calendar times 3 (three) 5-day periods = 72 pentads, personified as deities of fate and destiny).

That leaves 6 remaining cards not assigned to a trigram, but rather, to Xuan 玄:

In tarot and I Ching divination, when you draw the Magician, Chariot, Strength, Justice, Temperance, or Moon, it reveals one of the eight (again the 8) spirit helpers corresponding with Xuan, meaning Mystery. The paired card drawn with the Xuan card reveals one of the 8 doubled hexagrams in the 64 hexagrams of the I Ching.

It all circles and connects!

So, for example, if you pull the Magician card and the Queen of Wands, the Magician is a Xuan card, which means it doubles the trigram that the Queen of Wands corresponds to.

The Queen card in the Wands suit is part of the “Yin trigram” set. See above chart. Wands correspond with Fire.

Locate “Wands Fire-Yin set” in the below reference chart:

Wands Fire-Yin set, which is the grouping the Queen of Wands is in, corresponds with the trigram Thunder. Paired with The Magician card, one of the six Xuan cards, that means it’s Thunder doubled.

Thunder doubled corresponds with Hexagram 51 of the I Ching, and as a doubled hexagram, is one of the Eight Spirit Helpers (Xuan):

That’s just me explaining how the engine works, but if you just want to drive the car and don’t care about looking under the hood, the last page of that downloadable document has the straightforward tarot to trigram correspondences:

Plenty of Western occultist folks have endeavored to reconcile the tarot and I Ching systems, from Crowley to several modern practitioner takes. I find this particular approach, accounting for the aspects of astrology and astronomy that are universal in both Eastern and Western thought, reconciliation with Kabbalistic principles, and resonant with the core themes and meanings of each card, to work the best. And make the most sense.

Here are a few more quick-reference tables for Tarot and I Ching correspondences:

Or this version (go with whichever is easiest on your eyes):

GO HERE for more downloadable I Ching Reference Tables & Diagrams