#Apollo and hermes

[apollosothertwin]

Hermes loves to play pranks on the other gods, but especially Apollo. In fact, when he was growing up mainly under Apollo’s care (because we all know what happens when Zeus parents) Apollo was so shocked by little Hermes’ attempt at pranking him that it was adorable and Hermes is always trying to make his big brother happy.

[theic-manic]

Tarot Hellenic Deity Communication Post that should probably be a book someday.

Hello, Feeling inspired by some other posts about Deity identification via tarot I wanted to tweak their ideas and add some additional strategies that help me. This is a devotional post to two of my patron Gods, Lord Apollon and Lord Hermes, who are assisting me with my Oracular duties. Praise Apollo and Hermes.

Post index:

My Background

Some notes about this post

The Major Arcana: Intro

The Major Arcana Deities

The Minor Arcana Part 1: How to incorporate the Minor Arcana

The Minor Arcana Part 2: The Suits

The Minor Arcana: Part 3: The Courts Pentacles Swords Wands Cups

The Minor Arcana part 4: Notable Pip Cards

A Note on Gender

A Note on Symbolism

What the Hermes? (important!)

Deity Communication troubleshooting

How to incorporate Shufflemancy as a Tarot reading clarifier (link to another post)

Notable sources (used in addition to my own knowledge & research) My background: I started Tarot at the age of 11 (2001) and own dozens of different tarot and oracle decks, my exposure to various interpretations over almost 2.5 decades has allowed me to appreciate the nuances in interpretations and even assigned deities. As such, while I do know the broader meanings of each card, I also check the interpretation provided by various deck creators as their own divine guidance adds to my work. E.g. The Tower in my Murder of Crows deck has a very different vibe to The Tower in my Gold Lyre tarot deck. I will be covering deck design nuance after the list of card deities. Some notes about this post: Firstly: I will only be listing Hellenic deities as I currently work with the Hellenic Gods and while I have worked with the Kemetic Gods briefly, I have a distant while cordial relationship with them. I had worked with the Norse Gods for 3-4 years prior to moving to my current locale, however I acknowledge that my time with them has passed (at least for now) and I want to limit this to one pantheon. Secondly: In some of the other posts that assign deities to tarot cards, I found it odd that they would assign say, Freyja to some cards but not Aphrodite, arguably Freyja's Greek counterpart. As such, I will be taking care to check that I don't miss any deities due to these overlaps however this means that some deities will be gaining more cards than typically assigned. Note that some of the Gods of other pantheons have multiple equivalents in the Hellenic Pantheon so in the case that occurs, I will do my best to select whichever one already has their Hellenic equivalent listed by other sources and in cases that hasn't occurred, I will select/assign whichever Hellenic God/s best fit the card.

Thirdly: I won't be assigning deities to each of the numbered minor arcana for a couple of reasons; 1. Not all decks have imagery for these cards except for literal pentacles, wands, swords or cups images 2. While I prefer the Rider-Waite approach to providing story images to these minor cards, said images can be distracting to one's intuition or may add to the confusion. However I will explain how to incorporate these cards into your readings to gain clarity, especially if you draw Major Arcana that can be assigned to a couple of potential deities.

Finally: I will be adding the concept of Shufflemancy at the very bottom. This is optional but I find that it can really add to a reading... however as an Apollo and Hermes devotee I am a tad biased.

If you find this post to be useful please share it so that others may find it.

The Tarot Cards:

Major Arcana

The Fool: Pan, Hermes, Dionysus, Apollo, Morpheus

The Magician: Hermes, Apollo, Empusai

The High Priestess: Hekate, Selene, Artemis, Persephone, Aphrodite, Medusa, Melinoe, Lamia, Empusai

The Empress: Aphrodite, Hera, Demeter, Lamia, Empusai The Emperor: Zeus, Ares, Hades, Apollo

The Hierophant: Apollo, Athena, Hermes

The Lovers: Aphrodite & Ares, Eros & Psyche, Dionysus, Pan, Hades & Persephone, Lamia, Empusai The Chariot: Helios, Apollo, Hermes, Ares, Nike, Athena, Lamia Strength: Athena, Artemis, Medusa The Hermit: Kronos, Prometheus, The Muses*, Hades, Hermes, Hekate * The Muses appearing may also be a more subtle Apollo sign, use surrounding cards to guide your interpretation here. Wheel of Fortune: The Moirai*, Zeus, Hermes, Tyche, Morpheus * The Moirai are the triplet daughters of Kronos & Nyx or Zeus & Themis depending on which lore you refer to. They were also on friendly terms with Apollo and worshipped with Apollo at a number of shrines & temples. As such, please check surrounding cards carefully to determine which Hellenic deity/ies this acts as a confirmation card for. I would not rely on this card alone to confirm a deity's presence. Also pay attention to card imagery & any notes from the deck creator in the accompanying booklet if applicable.

Justice: Zeus, Athena, Themis

The Hanged Man: Artemis, Prometheus, Demeter, Poseidon, Hermes, Morpheus

Death: Persephone, Thanatos, Hades, Hekate, Melinoe, Lamia, Empusai

Temperance: Artemis, Iris, Apollo, Hades.

The Devil: Dionysus, Pan, Ares,

The Tower: Ares, Demeter, Eris, Perses.

The Star: Aphrodite, Hermes, Nyx, Astrea

The Moon: Artemis, Hekate, Selene, Morpheus. Medusa, Melinoe, Lamia, Empusai

The Sun: Apollo, Helios, Brigid, Eos

Judgement: Persephone, Hades, Hephaestus, Metatron, Nemisis

The World: Hermes, Nike, Gaia, Kronos, Athena, Demeter, Arachne

The Minor Arcana:

Intro:

As mentioned at the beginning, I won't be assigning deities to every single minor arcana card however I will be assigning deities to the suits, court cards & a few notable numbered cards to assist with deity identification.

Part 1: The Suits

Wands: Ares, Apollo, Eros, Hermes*

Swords: Ares, Athena, Hades, Athena, Hermes* , Poseidon*

Pentacles: Gaia, Demeter, Hephaestus, Athena

Cups: Aphrodite, Hermes* *Refer to Part 2b

Part 2a: The Courts Pentacles:

Pages: Pan, The Muses, Apollo Knights: Athena, Artemis, Demeter Queens: Persephone. Gaia, Demeter Kings: Hades, Chiron, Pan Swords:

Pages: Athena, Nike, Arachne Knights: Athena, Hermes Queens: Hekate. Athena, Themis, Melinoe Kings: Hephaestus, Hermes

Wands:

Pages: Apollo, Artemis, Athena Knights: Apollo, Orpheus Queens: Aphrodite, Hestia Kings: Zeus, Ares, Apollo

Cups:

Pages: Aphrodite, Eros Knights: Aphrodite Queens: Hera Kings: Poseidon, Dionysus

Part 2b: Notable Pip cards (Ace-10) Certain Pip cards of the Minor Arcana have strong deity connections based on their traditional meanings. I will not be covering the meanings as there are enough books covering this.

Aces: Pentacles- Demeter, Gaia, Swords- Athena, Nike Wands- Pan, Aphrodite and/or Ares, Apollo Cups - Aphrodite, The Nesoi, Eros

9 of Pentacles: Persephone 10 of Pentacles: Hephaestus, Arachne

2 of Swords: Hekate 3 of Swords: Hermes 4 of Swords: Arachne 5 of Swords: Ares, Eris, Melinoe 7 of Swords: Hermes 8 of Swords: Athena, Eris, Arachne 10 of Swords: Poseidon

3 of Wands: Hermes 5 of Wands: Hephaestus 8 of Wands: Dionysus 10 of Wands: Hephaestus

2 of Cups: Hermes with the caduceus, this can also clarify a divine partnership (Hades & Persephone, Ares & Aphrodite etc.) 8 of Cups: Nereus, Melinoe 10 of cups: Nike

Part 3: How to incorporate the minor Arcana

Whenever I am reaching out to deities via Tarot I do this in two stages. Stage 1: Deity identification Stage 2: What they want me to know (this is when a structured spread would be appropriate or simply apply traditional interpretations to the cards). Stage 1: With Deity identification stage I am purely interested in identifying who is in my room/orbit/astral right now but as you likely picked up in the Major Arcana list, many deities share cards and this can become confusing, especially if you draw cards that share the same gods. Solution: Look at the minor Arcana cards and which deities they align with to clarify which God is likely reaching out to you either via direct correspondence or relationship. Examples: 1. Sometimes I will draw Major arcana that are typically associated with Hermes & Apollo (makes sense as they're my patron gods) however if I also draw some wands* then I will typically sense that it is more Apollo that is reaching out whereas if swords pop out, or the 2 of cups, then I am getting a Hermes vibe. (*8 of wands is the one wands card I'd assign to Hermes due to its meaning) 2. If I draw some cards assigned to Ares and another God but draw some cups minor Arcana, I will then lean towards this being Ares as cups are associated with Aphrodite. I then consider how the minor arcana + Major Arcana identifiers act as Deity aspect (or vibe) identifiers. E.g. Ares Major Arcana + Cups cards will likely indicate to me that I am getting Ares' softer side. However if I get Ares + Swords, then I am likely being shown his more traditional warlike nature. If I draw Wands cards, then this is typically aligning with some more passionate energy from Ares. And this is when I gather the cards, reshuffle and commence stage 2 where I am seeking what message/s the identified God/s would like me to know. Even when I draw Major arcana in these readings, I will stick to their traditional interpretations rather than deity correspondences. This assists in me receiving a clearer message.

A Note on Gender:

If you are using a gender themed deck (e.g. a Goddess tarot deck) this may make deity identification more challenging for you as you could potentially mistake the identify of a deity depending on the style of the deck. If however you are confident with interpreting tarot or just work with goddesses or gods, that's cool too. Deities sometimes may appear as a gender not typically assigned to them as they find this is an easier way for you to connect with them.

Pages & Knights are gender neutral, so take their pictorial representation with a grain of salt if that helps.

A note on Symbolism: Some decks may have symbols to help you better discern which deity is reaching out, especially with cards that share numerous gods so please pay attention to the illustrations of the major arcana in addition to the clarifying minor arcana cards. Certain themed decks may make this easier or more difficult however if like me you own many tarot decks then the deck you feel called to use is a sign in itself. E.g. Whenever I feel drawn to my Golden Lyre deck, I know that Apollo and Hermes are going to show up (& they do). If I feel drawn to my Vlad the Dracula, Diablo or another "dark" deck, this to me has Ares energy. Ultimately, much of this depends on your connection with the divine, how you best communicate (e.g. which clair-sense is strongest for you), your physical & mental health and ongoing practice with the Gods and honing your intuition.

What the Hermes?! Hermes wanted me to mention that if you see a lot of his cards (you likely noticed that he is associated with many tarot cards) this means either a) your deity has an urgent message that they need him to deliver to you, b) the deity reaching out does not have very good history with one of your patron gods so he is delivering their message to keep the peace or c) the deity is just not good at communicating via tarot (see below)

Deity communication troubleshooting:

The cards are a real mixed bag and/or nothing makes sense: You might be tired, hungry, dehydrated or just not ready to receive messages.

Some Gods take longer than others to "talk": Oracular deities and deities with a decent history with Oracles & the likes are very vocal through tarot for me whereas other deities aren't very good at communicating through tarot & perhaps another method would be best such as Shufflemancy, meditation, tea leaves, automatic writing or a range of other methods. E.g. Ares takes a while to talk to me through tarot and that's often because 1. Apollo is very loud & Ares likes to... give him space and 2. There appear to be some stories of Ares potentially having poor experiences with oracles, e.g. an Oracle allegedly directing the people of various places in southern Asia Minor or the likes to bind Ares' statue in chains and even an annual rite involving this to force him into being more peaceful...  The oracle promises that "thus will he become a peaceful deity for you, once he has driven the enemy horde far from your country, and he will give rise to prosperity much prayed for." Wikipedia I'll admit my ignorance with much of Greek mythology however upon learning more about Ares' history with Apollo and certain Oracle cults I have learned to be more understanding of him taking longer to communicate this way. Even writing this & feeling my back hurt I can sense Ares' disapproval of Hermes & Apollo guiding me to write this post.

How to incorporate Shufflemancy as a Tarot reading clarifier:

Notable sources (used in addition to my own knowledge & research): https://backyardbanshee.com/tarot/deities-associated-with-tarot-cards/

Updates made July 14 2024:

I have started to add the lesser-known deities such as Medua, Lamia, Empusai, Arachne and Melinoe and will slowly add the others. Please comment or DM any Hellenic deity or spirit requests to be added.

[neal-illustrator]

I’m telling dad!

[strawberry-carpcake]

basically what happened

[historygirlie]

Yeah what happened to Hermes 🥲 Should we be worried???

Yes actually you should be really worried. Soooo ima go on a yapping session for everyone who is interested

Basically in my version of Hermes he is the funny guy, the silly one with a heartbreaker reputation just like everyone else’s. The thing is that let’s be honest no one can be that carefree all the time. In my way of perception I have this AU where young gods must prove themselves at a certain area to become fully a god. Hermes was left all alone since after his birth and the cattle incident, he was lucky Apollo didn’t send him to Tartarus. So while he is half deity and have not ascended yet, many monsters could track on his smell and attack him. Apollo and Artemis had similar experiences too but the fact that they were in Delos rather than in the wild was a giant benefit. Hermes on the other side wasn’t that lucky. He suffered a lot and the only trait that made him win his status was that he helped deliver a little wounded baby bird from one nest to another while his own wing was broken already. Apollo who had been watching him for awhile to see if he would be worth a god or not was hit hard by that action and chose to forgive Hermes. He took upon himself to raise him after he did ascend that day. Hermes still has a sore spot about the suffering he went through due to Apollo, but he loves his half brother a lot even if he doesn’t show it. In the picture above he is having that pain from his blinded eye.

Due to passing all that he did Hermes became a really protective god really. And here we come at the story of Dionysus:

Dionysus as a baby was refused and not liked by the other main gods (Hera and Zeus mostly). Literally Zeus was onto dumping the kid already. Hermes was totally against that idea and after Apollo suggested the idea to the god of speed, he volunteered to raise the kid. The other gods had nothing against it except Hera who was furious. After a few years of Hermes raising Dionysus up she cursed the young half deity with madness which blinded his judgement and sent him to earth with mortals. Hermes was beyond raged when he found out about the whole thing. He refused to send messages anymore and Iris to sympathise with her friend did so too. Olympians and the mortal world could no longer communicate at all. And Dionysus was still insane. That grunge continued for months in the end and finally Hera decided to take off the curse from Dionysus and focused on the other affairs Zeus was having. After all the child had no fault for being born even the way he was born. Hermes went then on a quest to find his little brother. Unfortunately due to the altering of place of living from god to mortal and back Dionysus had grown up way to fast losing a lot of his childhood and teenage years. Yet this whole ordeal had given him the approval of becoming a god. His memory was hazy but he did luckily remember Hermes and had him as a model. I should someday draw their reunion low-key cuz Hermes was bawling happy tears.

In the end the god of trickery, messages and speed has a lot more under his sleeve then we think. Whose story do you want to know next? (Low-key all these ideas randomly pop on my mind during maths class lol)

[theic-manic]

At the risk of inviting scrutiny, I just had an unhinged astrology girlie realisation, courtesy of channel 7 in Australia choosing the worst time to announce their astrology segment:

We are in what is called mercury retrograde shadow period or "retroshade"

Mercury is about communication and the pre retrograde shadow period involves bad luck and misfortune, drama etc and Trump was shot at his ear...

MAYBE TRUMP SHOULD HIRE A FUCKING ASTROLOGER

Or maybe all of USPOL can idfk I'm just an Australian Hellenic currently delivering Hermes + Apollo inspired semi educational spiritual shitposting.

That said... perhaps he already has an astrologer, and his ad campaign was partly astrology inspired idfk.

This post does not reflect my personal or political views, I am merely noticing coincidences but I do hope to see the astrologers comment on recent events.

I am somewhat inclined to do another political tarot reading though last time I did I wasn't mentally prepared for the blunt accuracy.

[the-literal-sun]

Cattle are missing, time to take a child to court.

[laritamiauu]

drunk divas

[thingsphoenix21]

HERMES APOLLO DYNAMIC.

Hermes: I'm sorry guys if you worked a little harder you might get an offering. Apollo: That dosen't count, Dionysus gave you half of his. Hermes: It's okay to be jelaous... Feel what you need to feel. Apollo: This is stupid. --- Eros: Why are we bringing the sun guy? Hermes: Because we can't boil water. Apollo *does his little dancy dance* --- Hermes *trying to save their ass*: He's the best singer in the Olympus. You have never heard a better song in your life, Hermes word. --- Hermes: how about you carry the head for a while? Apollo: New guy carries the mortal head.

[paintsplatter151]

Hey there guys! I know I haven’t posted in a long while but I thought to try posting here again to show off some of my art. On tiktok I’ve been working on this kinda little drawing series where I draw the Greek gods and goddesses in how I perceive them so I’ll show you the ones I’ve done so far. Also they were inspired from listening to epic the musical

Hermes

Poseidon

Apollo

Aphrodite

Hermes and Apollo

Dionysus

Hephaestus

I hope to work on more Greek gods and goddesses in the future but so far these are my completed ones

(and if you really like them I sell these as physical prints in my Etsy shop called Rest In Paint Shop)

[theic-manic]

Hermes: "no headphones while shopping, I have a surprise"

Me: "... okay"

I get to the supermarket.

Hermes, having taken over the store's song algorithm: "Hey Apollo! I dedicate this to you" 😘

*You're so vain plays on the speakers*

Apollo: 😑"I see that it's attack Apollo day... Dear, next time he demands an energy drink, tell him to eat a bag of deep fried dicks"

Hermes: *faux outraged gasp* "RUDE"

Me: *smiling* "Well that eased the anxiety attack, thank you"

Hermes & Apollo in unison: "You're welcome!"

[neal-illustrator]

I fought my dad and all I got was this cool scar and some trauma

[strawberry-carpcake]

I made this at 1am

[theic-manic]

Hermes, whenever Apollo gives me vague messages

[theic-manic]

Apollo being understandably dramatic about the loss of his mortal lovers and Hermes just deadass drops "you fucked around, you found out"

Source

[potato-lord-but-not]

EPIC FANS GATHER ROUND !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! witness my insane character designs and say NOTHING about my obvious lack of Greek mythology knowledge thank u