The crossed keys
Two crossed keys lie at the Hierophant’s feet: the keys of the kingdom that Jesus gives Peter in Matthew’s Gospel, and the arms of the papacy.
In the tradition
In Matthew 16, Jesus tells Peter, "I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven." The papacy took the crossed keys, one gold and one silver, as its arms, and the older decks called this card the Pope.
Following the Golden Dawn, Waite called the card the Hierophant, after the high priest of the Greek mysteries, but kept the triple crown and the keys. He contrasts the card with the High Priestess: she holds the hidden law, he the outer and orthodox one.
Sources
- A. E. Waite, The Pictorial Key to the Tarot (1910). Waite's own guide to the deck he designed with Pamela Colman Smith, with each card's divinatory meanings.
- Various, The Bible (King James Version 1611; the Latin Vulgate, 4th century). The source of much of the Temple, Eden and Revelation imagery in the Rider-Waite-Smith deck.
Updated October 9, 2026.
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