I finished writing this moonth’s post yesterday and almost sent it off. But I decided to wait for one more look and possible polish before sharing. Yesterday I started with hope and a little exuberance:

On January 21st the new moon arrives to remind us that renewal is possible. Before there was darkness—the moon stripped of sun’s reflection—but then the moment (3:53 pm ET, time zone converter ) that tips us toward the light—the birth of the next lunar cycle.

The new moon also ushers in the Lunar New Year on January 22nd, which is celebrated by a quarter of the earth’s population. The energy for renewal is powerful right now!

So it is fitting that at this time of year, we are invited to walk the soul shaping path of The Star.  

Then I woke up this morning and the headlines here in the US were horrific. Another mass shooting in the predominantly Asian American community of Monterey Park at a ballroom dance venue. Now the second day of Lunar New Year’s celebration in Monterey Park has been canceled “out of an abundance of caution.”

My heart goes out to the families of all of those murdered and the community waking up to this horror.

To break our hearts open even more, this year is the first year that California is officially celebrating Lunar New Year and this recognition was greeted happily. Reverend Fong, an organizer of San Francisco’s parade explained the importance of the holiday:  “It’s [about] the renewal of relationships, the forgiveness of debts and it’s almost religious in that it’s a new beginning for your life.”

We are all bystanders now—again!—to personal, political, and spiritual violence. Another way to say this is that we are all witnesses this day to the murder of innocent people during a state-recognized holiday of spiritual significance.

Can the Tarot offer anything to move us through this violence and into healing? Well, the post I finished last night, inspired primarily by the unpleasant—even disturbing—image of the Five of Swords, focused on practice for repair. The card itself did not offer the answer but its image prompted me to look to contemporary thinkers to find models for addressing the problems that we face.

I’ll return now to that original post (with a few additional resources that might be a support for repair in the aftermath of the shooting).

The Star appears after times of difficulty to offer us hope, to call us to renew, and to shed a gentle light on the change emerging.

The Star follows Death, the Devil, and the Tower, the fearsome three of the Tarot pantheon, through which we die to our old lives, confront the shadows we can no longer hide from, and experience the structures we counted on crumble. After this process, we are stripped down to our essential self, find ourselves as open as the Star figure. We may feel alone, but the Star reminds us that we are held within a vast and beautiful Cosmos, which constantly pours its gifts upon us.

This year the Star’s path takes us through the passage of the Five of Swords.

In the iconic Rider Waite Smith Tarot’s Five of Swords, a large, orange-haired figure in the foreground stands confidently holding three swords while two empty-handed figures in the background walk away. The furthest figure appears to be holding their face in their hands, their shoulders are slumped. A third figure stands between and seems to be looking at the one holding their face. Jagged clouds in the background whip along above the rippling ocean.

The highlighted figure seems to have won the battle, which could give this card a meaning of victory, vindication, or success. But a traditional name for this card is the Lord of Defeat. This name shifts our orientation to those who have lost their swords and seemingly their fight. Placing these figures at the center of the card’s story calls us  to contemplate not victory but themes such as harm experienced and inflicted, being wronged, being a bystander to harm, and abuse of power.

Nearly a century before scholars and activists popularized the triangle of victim/survivor, bystander, and perpetrators, Pixie Smith created an image to show this web of relationships—inviting we who receive this image to the soul work of repairing harm.

Ah, but these are such painful topics. Could they really be a passage of the beautiful, hopeful Star?

The answer is, of course, yes. The Star remains with us through the darkest nights, through our greatest challenges. The Star sees us not as winners or losers. No matter what we do, the Star offers gentle light to help us through, to invite us to the path of repair. Our commitment to moving through this passage connects us to what the poet Kathleen Aguero calls “the hard work of hope.” 

Because the hope that heals is actively engaged with the most difficult challenges of our times. This is the hope we are called to cultivate when we encounter the Five of Swords passage.

I’m reading a book right now that gives a form and practice for such an active hope: On Repentance and Repair by Danya Ruttenberg. She is a rabbi presenting the teaching of the 12th century philosopher and scholar of Jewish law, Moses Maimonides, for how those who have harmed can make amends. Which means most of us, maybe all of us. Rabbi Ruttenberg states that we all have caused harm, been harmed, and been bystanders to harm. These experiences happen not just in personal ways but also because we are part of larger systems that perpetuate oppression.

Because her focus is on those who have harmed, she does not focus on healing strategies for those who have been harmed, but the approach she offers centers the victim/survivor and their needs—for immediate care, on-going repair, and speaking their own truth. Bystander interventions are also outside the focus of the book. Activists working against sexual violence and racist, homophobic and transphobic actions and comments have developed trainings to prepare us to act in immediate situations. For situations like the Monterey Park murders that are part of a larger history, we can pay attention rather than look away and look to impacted communities for their requests to use for action (I’m watching for what AAPI Women Lead call to action will be.)

Rabbi Ruttenberg writes out of the Jewish tradition but offers Maimonides’ teachings in a five-step sequence for a broad audience. (Steps and essential message below are hers. Summaries—and any errors in thinking—are mine. Read the book to gather all her detailed wisdom.)

Step One: Naming and Owning the Harm

The harm caused needs to be named and acknowledged. This is easily said, but not as easily done.

When we hear we have caused harm our first reaction may be to defend ourselves and deflect the truth. We may need a process that includes support from skilled helpers (therapist, spiritual director, a consciousness raising group for white or straight people, for example) to work through to acceptance.

This work is not to be done with those harmed. Our stumbling through to full awareness could cause further harm that should not be inflicted on them.

Once the full harm is understood, it needs to be stated publicly within the context in which the harm was inflicted. This is the beginning, not the end, of a process of repair.

Step Two: Starting to Change

Not just words are required for repair. Different kinds of actions must be taken not only toward the one harmed but within the wider community.

Step Three: Restitution and Accepting Consequences

Rabbi Ruttenberg shares Maimonides five areas where damages must be paid: for the injury itself, the pain suffered, medical costs, time away from work, and humiliation. This restitution could range from money to an individual to cover a direct damage or therapy for psychological distress to nations paying reparations to communities that have experienced historical and ongoing harm such as land dispossession, slavery, and genocide.

The one who has harmed is also called to accept consequences for the harmful actions and willingly take on payment of the restitution or punishments.

Step Four: Apology 

The ones harmed determines when, how, and if an apology is to be made to them directly. The one apologizing must detail their understanding of what they did wrong and center the experience of the one they harmed.

Note that asking for forgiveness is not part of this step.  Forgiveness may or may not be part of the process Ruttenberg suggests. The focus here is on the one who has harmed changing themselves, not asking for another to change by giving forgiveness.

The apology must be offered without expectation of receiving anything in return.

Step Five: Making Different Choices

Most people do not harm intentionally. The abuse we inflict may come from coping behaviors we developed out of harm we have experienced. Or, as Rabbi Ruttenberg describes, “those who have any kind of privilege (white people, for example, or wealthy people, or men) say and do things that support the dominant power structures at least some of the time—intentionally or not, our of malice or out of ignorance, or out of a perspective poisoned by the normalization of ideas that are racist, ableist, transphobic, fatphobic.” 

Harmful behaviors that spring both from coping and privilege are rooted within us and will take work to uproot. To make different choices that will keep us from continuing harm will require on-going examination of behaviors, identifying and practicing new behaviors, and changes in how we act. This will require not just a statement of “I’m sorry,” but a long-term process of personal change, possibly a whole lifetime of unlearning and learning anew.

Rabbi Ruttenberg ends her outline of Maimonides steps with:

Repentance—tshuuvah—is like the Japanese art of kintsugi, repairing broken pottery with gold. You can never unbreak what you have broken. But with the sincere and deep work of transformation, acts of repair have the potential to make something new. 

We can walk this path of challenge and of hope when we emulate the qualities of the King of Swords. 

The King is a master of the mind and uses their intellect to serve the good of the Whole. 

To be like this King, we assess rather than block feelings, and we do not allow ourselves to be controlled by them. Once the emotions are acknowledged, we can look at current reality analytically, assess options from a larger perspective, and identify how our personal choices might impact others.

Working from the highest potential of the King, we are able to hear feedback about our impact on others, even to learn that we have caused harm. We might go through a range of emotions even recognize our defensiveness, but remain open to the message that is being offered. Then to act quickly to change behavior. If we have a King role in our lives—being a manager, minister, or head of state, for example—we move our organizations and institutions to be agents of change and transformation to eliminate harm.

Being like Kings, we remind people that hope is fed by action and we all have a role to play in the work of renewal.

In the aftermath of another of so very, very many mass shootings incited by the racism entrenched in our social, cultural, and political systems, it may seem foolish to believe that change can happen.

If it seems foolish to dare to believe we can repair, the Tarot supports us to be that Fool. In fact, using the correspondences of astrology and Tarot, we find that The Fool, through its association with the planet of innovation Uranus, is said to rule The Star. To be Star beings we must follow The Fool. 

I know some Fools. They are working on reparations for African Americans in the Valley where I live. And members of the Nipmuc Nation are leading the push to have a state-owned farm rematriated to their care. These are local examples of national movements that Rabbi Ruttenberg writes about in her book. She also writes about how Germany came to its reparations work following the Holocaust, attributing the success it has had—while acknowledging it is not perfect—to grassroots movements in the 1960s and 1980s. In the 1960s young people—some might call them fools—engaged in grassroots organizing and then when they were adults in positions of responsibility continued the work.

The work is continuous—as continuous as the stars’ appearance in the night sky. The ancient Egyptians were close observers of stars, like the Pole Star, that did not set. Called the Imperishable Stars, they served as an image of eternity and a reminder of the constant presence of the Gods and Goddess in the people’s lives. The Tarot’s Star, too, reminds us of this Divine accompaniment, both when we are aware of Her presence and even when we doubt it. She holds us within Her embrace as we rest, and in the resting are reshaped. From here we will emerge into a new wholeness made from our broken parts.

Reading of the Moonth

These questions are offered for reflection and to spark practice throughout the moonth. Pulling Tarot and oracle cards in connection to these questions is appropriate, but not absolutely necessary. You might carry a question with you on a walk for example and observe what is happening in the natural world as a way to find insight into the answer to the question.

REPAIR: What work of repair does Five of Swords passage call me to this moonth?

ACTION: How can I engage in the repair work this moonth?

RENEW: How will I be contributing to the renewal of the Whole when I commit to this work?

I do offer this as an e-reading in my collaborative initiative format for $23.  Sign up with Pay Pal or email me about sending a check. I generally have time for these readings on Mondays and Saturdays. When I receive notification, I’ll be in touch to let you know about when to expect to receive your reading by email.