Minor Arcana, Swords
King of Swords
judgment, authority, reason, law
Upright
A ruler sits facing forward with a drawn sword held upright, the calmest face in the suit. Waite sums up the card as everything that arises from judgment: power, command, authority, militant intelligence and law.
A hard decision at work benefits from this stance. Gather the evidence, hear each side and give your reasons aloud. Where a real legal matter is involved, the card predicts nothing, so speak to a qualified lawyer and weigh that advice with care.
Reversed
Authority loses its conscience here. Waite's words are cruelty, perversity, barbarity, perfidy and evil intention, and they describe power used to hurt.
A manager or partner who uses rules to humiliate you may come to mind, or your own temptation to use your position that way. Keep written records, find someone independent to talk to, and seek proper legal or safety advice when the harm is serious.
A card is a prompt for reflection. It cannot promise a result, and it is no substitute for medical, legal or financial advice.
In Waite's words
Upright: Whatsoever arises out of the idea of judgment and all its connexions—power, command, authority, militant intelligence, law, offices of the crown, and so forth.
Reversed: Cruelty, perversity, barbarity, perfidy, evil intention.
From A. E. Waite, The Pictorial Key to the Tarot (1910), Part 3, on Wikisource. The meanings above are by Cast & Chart.
Card art by Pamela Colman Smith, 1909, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.