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Like all good symbols, all aspects of the symbol above are significant: the centre and the circumference are interdependent. In the context of the Tarot, the World and the Fool card are both expressing idea of being the centre and the circumference simultaneously. As Guénon points out, the circumference and the centre require each other; without the fixed centre, the circumference cannot rotate, as the centre is the “unmoved mover” for the circumference. Without the circumference, there is nothing for the centre to be a centre of—it would just be a random point in space without definition. The circumference literally defines where and what the centre is. To that avail, what Guénon is suggesting is that the classical symbol for the Sun, as seen above, is actually more of a World Axis or Polar symbol rather than a Solar symbol. This is because the symbol itself evokes the idea of rotation or wheel, which is most akin to how we observe the heavens’ rotation around the Pole Star.

If you think about it, there is no wrong interpretation of the symbol (Solar or Polar), it’s just a matter of what perspective you’re choosing to observe it from. If we take the Solar perspective, and that the Earth is revolving around the Sun, the Sun is the centre point and the Earth is the exterior circumference. If we take the Polar perspective, the centre would be the World Axis, or Earth itself, and the circumference could be the rest of the heavens which revolve around the Pole Star.

How does this relate to the Fool card?

This is quite interesting in the context of the Fool and the World. As mentioned, they both have centre and circumference symbolism within them (in both the Marseille and Rider-Waite decks). The Fool is the unnumbered card in the Marseille deck, and the zero card in the Rider-Waite deck. Whether it is zero or unnumbered, the Fool is often considered to be a “point of departure” for the entire Major Arcana. The zero, having no value, is dimensionless—literally a point that is immoveable. Even mathematically the zero always “returns to itself”—everything multiplied by zero is zero. Dividing by zero is a whole other problem with a similar ending. Zero, too, is considered the axis of the number line—the dimensionless point which separates