Rider Waite Card Meaning - The Devil

XV - The Devil - Bondage or Commitment

Waite’s image of the Devil serves as a powerful allegory for slavery and bondage. The figure is a hybrid beast: part man, part goat, part bat, and part predatory bird, as seen in the talons upon which he perches on a post. His prey is the man and the woman in the foreground, held to his perch by chains. The tail of the woman ends in a cluster of grapes, signifying perhaps a tainted vine. The man’s tail ends in a fiery plume and is suggestive of consuming passion. The man and the woman have no will of their own. They exist, chained by the desire for something bigger than they are.

This card indicates struggles of will, faltering willpower, and fear of change. The questioner holds back from the ordinary flow and pleasure of life because of need and dependency. There may be addictions or excessive pride and belligerence, chaining people to their own vanity and neurosis. On the one hand, this card describes intense sensual pleasure, but on the other, it speaks of weakness and the inability to pull oneself out of the paralyzing grip of pleasure for pleasure’s sake.

Reversed, the Devil card shows a successful break from conditions of tyranny, self-imposed or otherwise. Life begins to run at a normal keel again, and a healthy balance is restored once the chains of need and dependency are broken. Freedom from obligation can bring absolute joy.