Exploring Susan Chang's Tarot Correspondences

A tarot reader in 2020 spreads the Major Arcana across a table and sees something she had missed for years: the Magician is not just a figure with tools, but a node connecting Mercury, the number one, the path of Beth on the Kabbalistic Tree of Life, and the element of Air. She found this not through intuition but through a book. Susan Chang’s “Tarot Correspondences” (2018, Llewellyn) is the first comprehensive reference work that maps every card in the modern tarot deck across 27 separate systems of correspondence, from astrology and Hebrew letters to plants, gems, and colors. It is not a book of interpretations. It is a toolkit for building them.

The meta description: Susan Chang’s 2018 book “Tarot Correspondences” maps every tarot card across 27 systems of occult symbolism, giving readers the raw data to build their own interpretations.

What Makes “Susan Chang’s Tarot Correspondences” Different

Most tarot books tell you what a card means. The Lovers means choice. The Tower means upheaval. The Ten of Cups means emotional fulfillment. Chang does something different: she gives you the ingredients and trusts you to cook.

Her book is organized as a reference encyclopedia. For each of the 78 cards, she lists correspondences across 27 categories: astrological signs and planets, Hebrew letters, paths on the Tree of Life, numbers, elements, musical notes, colors, gemstones, plants, animals, and several more. The result is not a book you read cover to cover. It is a book you return to, card by card, when a reading stalls and you need fresh data.

The method is not new. It is a systematization of approaches that trace back to the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn (1888) and the writing of Aleister Crowley (1875-1947). But Chang organizes that sprawling tradition into a single usable table. The word “correspondence” in occult practice means the web of symbolic links that connect spiritual principles across different domains. The planet Mercury corresponds to the god Hermes, to the number eight, to the color yellow, to the metal quicksilver. Chang simply extends this logic to every card in the deck.

The History Behind the System: Where These Correspondences Come From

The idea that symbolic systems map onto each other is older than tarot itself. The Kabbalistic tradition of Jewish mysticism, dating to the 12th century or earlier, mapped the 22 Hebrew letters onto paths on the Tree of Life. When Renaissance occultists like Marsilio Ficino (1433-1499) and Giovanni Pico della Mirandola (1463-1494) encountered Kabbalah, they began fusing it with astrology, alchemy, and Neoplatonic philosophy.

The tarot deck itself emerged in 15th-century northern Italy as a card game. It was the French occultist Eliphas Lévi (born Alphonse-Louis Constant, 1810-1875) who first argued, in his 1854 “Dogme et Rituel de la Haute Magie,” that the 22 Major Arcana cards corresponded to the 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet. Lévi had no historical evidence for this claim. He asserted it as magical truth, and the occult tradition accepted it as fact.

The Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, founded in London in 1888, took Lévi’s system and built an elaborate edifice on it. Members like S.L. MacGregor Mathers (1854-1918) and A.E. Waite (1857-1942) assigned each Major Arcana card to a Hebrew letter, a path on the Tree of Life, an astrological sign or planet, and an element. The Minor Arcana received astrological and elemental correspondences too. Aleister Crowley and Lady Frieda Harris pushed this system further in the Thoth Tarot (completed 1943, published 1969), reassigning several cards based on Crowley’s own magical experiments.

Chang’s contribution is not a new system. It is a comprehensive synthesis of these multiple overlapping traditions, organized so a reader can see them at once. Where Crowley or Waite might disagree on a correspondence, Chang notes the difference. Where the Golden Dawn assigned the Star to the Hebrew letter Tzaddi and Crowley reassigned it to Heh, she includes both.

How the Correspondences Work: One Card, Twenty-Seven Systems

Take the Empress, the third card of the Major Arcana. Chang’s entry lists her correspondences across 27 categories. Here is a partial sample:

• Astrology: Venus
• Kabbalistic path: Path 14, connecting Chokmah (Wisdom) and Binah (Understanding)
• Hebrew letter: Daleth (door)
• Element: Earth (in some systems) or the feminine principle
• Number: 3
• Color: Emerald green, rose pink
• Gemstone: Emerald, peridot
• Plant: Myrtle, fig
• Animal: Dove, swan
• Musical note: E (in some systems)
• Alchemical principle: The Prima Materia in its fertile aspect

A reader who knows the Empress only as a card of abundance and fertility can now deepen that understanding. Venus makes her about love and beauty. Daleth makes her a gateway. The number 3 makes her about growth and manifestation. Myrtle was sacred to Aphrodite. The dove was the symbol of Venus. Each correspondence adds a layer.

The point is not that every correspondence must be memorized. It is that when a card appears in a reading and its standard meaning feels insufficient, the correspondences provide ways in. A reader who sees the Empress and thinks of Venus can check the current Venus transit. A reader who knows Kabbalah can trace the path from Chokmah to Binah. A reader who works with plants can set sprigs of myrtle on their reading table.

Practical Use: How Readers Actually Work with the Book

Chang’s book is not a grimoire you read at the altar. It is a reference volume you keep open beside your cards.

The most common use is troubleshooting. When a card appears in a reading and its conventional meaning does not fit, the correspondences suggest alternative frames. A client receiving the Hermit might not resonate with “isolation and introspection.” But the Hermit corresponds to Virgo, the number 9, the Hebrew letter Yod, and the path that connects Kether to Tiphareth on the Tree of Life. If the reader knows Virgo is about analysis and service, they can pivot: the Hermit here is not a recluse but a craftsman who works in solitude.

Another use is building custom spreads. A reader who knows that the Ten of Swords corresponds to the Sun in Gemini can design a spread around solar themes or Mercurial communication. A reader designing a New Moon ritual can pull cards corresponding to the Moon card itself, which governs the 28-day lunar cycle through its path on the Tree of Life.

Advanced practitioners use the book for meditative work. Taking the Magician’s correspondence to Mercury, they might place a citrine crystal on their altar (Mercury’s stone), burn frankincense (Mercury’s plant), and intone the note D (associated with Mercury in some systems) before drawing the card. Chang does not prescribe these practices. She provides the reference data, and the practitioner builds the ritual.

Notable Figures and Adjacent Systems

Chang stands in a lineage. The most important predecessor is Aleister Crowley’s “The Book of Thoth” (1944), which explains the correspondences of the Thoth Tarot in dense, often opaque prose. Crowley assumed his reader was already a practicing magician. Chang assumes her reader is anyone with a tarot deck.

Another major source is Robert Wang’s “The Qabalistic Tarot” (1983), which maps tarot to the Tree of Life in systematic detail. Wang wrote for an audience already versed in Kabbalah. Chang brings that material to a wider readership.

The 27 categories in Chang’s book include several drawn from Western ceremonial magic: the Olympic spirits, the Sephiroth, the geomancy figures. These appear in the work of Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa (1486-1535), whose “Three Books of Occult Philosophy” (1531) established many of the correspondence systems that Chang systematizes. A reader who wants to go deeper can trace each correspondence back through Agrippa, through the Golden Dawn manuscripts, through Crowley’s commentaries.

Common Misconceptions

The most frequent misunderstanding is that Chang’s correspondences are prescriptive. They are not. She is not saying that the Empress must mean Venus. She is showing that the Empress has been linked to Venus by a century of occult tradition, and that link can be used or discarded as the reader chooses.

Another error is treating the correspondences as a code to be deciphered. A card’s meaning is not hidden in its correspondences like a cypher. The correspondences are tools for generating meaning, not keys to a single correct reading.

Some readers also assume that using correspondences requires memorization. It does not. The book is designed to be consulted. Even experienced practitioners flip pages. What matters is not what you remember but what you use.

FAQ

Do I need to know Kabbalah to use Susan Chang’s Tarot Correspondences? No. The book includes a glossary and explanatory material. You can ignore the Kabbalistic correspondences and still use the astrological, elemental, or botanical ones.

How is this book different from Crowley’s Book of Thoth? Crowley explains one specific deck from one specific philosophical framework. Chang covers multiple decks and traditions, including the Rider-Waite-Smith, the Thoth, and the Marseille. She also organizes the material for quick reference rather than linear reading.

Can I use these correspondences with any tarot deck? Yes. The correspondences are systems of meaning, not deck-specific images. They work with any deck that follows traditional attributions.

Is this book for beginners or advanced readers? Both, but differently. Beginners can use it as a reference when a card’s meaning feels thin. Advanced readers will find it useful for constructing rituals, designing spreads, and exploring neglected correspondences.

Closing

Susan Chang’s work sits alongside the foundational reference texts of the occult revival. It does not replace Crowley or Wang. It makes them accessible. For the reader who has ever stared at a card and felt the standard interpretations were missing something, the correspondences are a door. Our guide to advanced tarot reading expands on how to apply these systems in practice. For those who want to trace the Kabbalistic roots further, the glossary entry on the Tree of Life explains the paths and spheres that Chang maps onto the cards. And for readers ready to build their own correspondences from scratch, our guide on building a personal tarot system offers a framework adapted from the method Chang used to construct her book.