Justice comes to us with a pretty self-explanatory meaning, truth and justice. However, like all the major arcana we can really dig into the meaning of Justice to find avenues around the themes of honesty and truth that we may not have faced within ourselves yet. With Justice, we are asked to cut to the truth of a situation, we become judge and jury and have to look at things objectively in order to make the right decisions and move ourselves forward into the following energy of The Hanged Man.

Upright

In the upright position, Justice asks us to balance the scales within the context of our lives or the situation we are asking the cards about. We have to be honest with ourselves about what is out of whack and look at how we can rebalance things for the better. The main upright meanings of Justice are:

• Fairness

• Balance

• Legalities

• Rational decision making

Justice has a strong feeling of air energy, with its very level headedness and emphasis on logical and statistical thinking. It’s also a card ruled by Libra! We are asked to look at the facts and put feeling to one side for a second, so that we can gain clarity that we may not have managed to conjure previously.

Reversed

In the reversed position, Justice mirrors the same energy we would see in the failings of our external justice system. It represents the outcomes that materialise when we ignore balance and truth in favour of our own opinions and beliefs. Some of the main reversed meanings of Justice are:

• Injustice

• Imbalance

• Prejudice

• Bias

• Manipulation

The main keyword of Justice in the reversed position is dishonesty. It symbolises what happens when we throw morality out the window and take a more selfish standpoint.

Reading Justice in a spread

Justice always pops up when we are out of balance, when things need to be analysed and we need to clean house. Often this can refer to things like putting things in place to better look after your health and wellbeing or just finding ways to create more balance and harmony within key areas of your life.

It can also pop up when we are put into a situation where are morals and beliefs are being tested. We have to get back in touch with our authentic selves in order to find truth.

As an invitation

When we frame Justice as an invitation, we are being asked to look through an objective lens and collect all the facts in order to make a logical and sound decision. It is a card that invites you to find your own way back to balance and to be able to identify when something isn’t aligned with your own beliefs.

For Justice, this invitation could be the following:

• An invitation to assess the situation with objectivity in order to find clarity

• An invitation to do a life audit and see where you could make improvements for your own benefit

• An invitation to to align yourself with your core beliefs before taking action or acting impulsively

• An invitation to think about the ideas of right and wrong and identify the grey areas you may be faced with when dealing with a situation

As sage advice

With Justice, we get very stern and straight forward advice. It can often seem a very black and white way of looking at the world, but often it is the lens we need to look through within this particular situation. As it’s an air card, Justice advice is definitely worth following as it is based in sound reasoning and logical thinking.

Some advice Justice may offer is:

• There are two sides to every story and we must be able to see both sides equally in order to get the full picture

• Life works on balance and when something is out of whack, it can have a knock on effect to other areas of our lives

• If you can’t be honest with yourself then how can you expect to see the world with clear eyes?

As a lesson

Often, Justice is our first lesson in honesty and being truthful to ones self. After the lack of control we faced in the previous card, the Wheel of Fortune, Justice allows us to take stock of where we’ve landed and really learn about how we see the world and whether we are moral, ethical and honest.

Some lessons that Justice may offer you are:

• A lesson in balance and creating balance in your life in order to stay healthy

• A lesson in honesty, both with yourself and with others and how it can create stronger relationships and solid foundations for the future

• A lesson in how our actions always have consequences

• A lesson in how to make rational decisions, even if it means at the expense of our desired outcome

As a redirection

Justice often appears as a redirection when we are not being honest with ourselves, or we are only focusing on the parts that benefit us directly and not on the picture as a whole. It can often be a moment that brings us crashing down to earth, but it is most often for our own good or the good of others.

As a redirection, Justice could symbolise a need to:

• See all sides of an argument or situation in order to make the most rational decision

• Sacrifice what we impulsively want in order to do what is right

• To stop acting from a place of emotion and start thinking about things in a more logical way

In summary…

The Justice card is the keeper of truth and justice, it is a card that places us firmly in the spotlight and asks us to make the tough decisions. It can be a very difficult card to work through, especially when it is in the context of personal or spiritual development, as we can often be blind to our own truths.