A Last Quarter Moon of a Graceful Shift in Attitude

Monday evening’s Last Quarter Moon in Aquarius is a very interesting configuration, emphasizing Mars and Venus, in the final week of a lunation cycle that also featured these two personal planet archetypes of action, aesthetics, and relationship. Venus aspects all three major outer planets, Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto, while Mars is closely parallel Saturn and square to Uranus. The Sun in mid-Taurus also opposes Jupiter in Scorpio, with the Moon in square, indicating edgy opportunity that is very present for us now. We have been dealing with these relationship-oriented life themes all this time, since mid-April, and have arrived at some novel conclusions that we are now ready to put into concrete realization. This current lunar phase in any case represents a major shift in attitude, what seminal 20th century astrologer Dane Rudhyar called a “crisis in consciousness.” You have summed up for yourself the accumulated knowledge gained in response to the events of the past three weeks of the cycle, and are ready to put this information to use. This is thus a vitally important moment in your ongoing spiritual evolution; a time of changing ideas about your situation. And ideas are powerful.

All this Venus emphasis is very telling, especially considering that Venus is now traveling through Gemini, the sign of her esoteric rulership. It might seem strange to bring love and mental function together in the same conception; however at the highest level there is a certain logic to Love. There really is no other choice. Perhaps, just as trees are “thoughts in the mind of God,” relationships are also. In addition to her sojourn in Mercury-ruled Gemini, at the 16-degree mark, we find Venus bi-quintile Pluto, and in partile square to Neptune at the same degree of Pisces, with Uranus at their approximate midpoint. These latter two connections bring to love and art a numinous and ethereal feeling tone, in sympathetic vibration with otherworldly dimensions beyond the physical plane. This promotes a higher form of interpersonal bonding. Meanwhile, Saturn is also powerful in this lunation cycle, and in this current configuration in particular. The parallel between Mars and Saturn has been growing stronger through the cycle thus far, increasing Saturn’s dominance, while Saturn remains parallel to Pluto. Right now there is a subtle aspect between Jupiter and Saturn as well, a septile, which previews their upcoming conjunction in 2020. Societal transformation is on our minds. The Venus aspects suggest no limit at all to the depth, and even the height, of our relationships, while the Saturn energy, in contrast, imposes limits and commitment. As far as relating is concerned, this is therefore a quite interesting juncture, when we will feel called to explore our significant connections with each other more fully.

In Monday’s configuration also, we find Mercury in close conjunction with Eris, the new planet beyond Pluto representing a spiritual warrior energy in support of soul intention. Eris is also in square with Pluto, an aspect that will perfect in 2020. For this current moment, this implies that we are thinking about our future, in an important and quite particular way that includes our most sincere values and how to imagine and begin to act on the concept of making a principled stand for these. The close alignment of Saturn and Mars together implies commitment. This Mercury aspect, taken at its most profound level, provides a path toward embracing the meaning of why we are here, the mission that we came into this lifetime to fulfill.

The Sabian Symbols for the Sun and Moon in this Last Quarter Moon configuration are equally telling. They are, for the Sun in the eighteenth degree (17 plus) of Taurus, “A woman holding a bag out of a window.” This symbol seems mysterious at first, but at least suggests that something beyond the ordinary is going on. Marc Edmund Jones, himself possessed with quite a strong placement of Eris, has this to say: “There is here an exaltation of every commonplace activity [leading to] the soul’s high ministry of service to every purpose and function of living, and of the individual’s self-fulfillment as [one who] furthers the over-all ends of [humanity] in general… a high personal effectiveness in commandeering the elements of experience for any particular purpose.” For the Moon in the same degree of Aquarius we find, “A man unmasked.” This Jones relates to higher knowledge, referencing, “the human mind’s illimitable power for penetrating into the deeper stirrings and underlying motivations of human nature, and of a modern determination to gain a scientific mastery of every psychological process.” In this 21st century, nearly one hundred years after Jones sponsored and described these symbols, we might be forced to adopt a more cautionary attitude regarding such mastery and control, and yet we get his general conception. Truly, we must join with nature in striving to evolve, and to acknowledge our most profound truth, thereby becoming the very best and most fulfilled version of ourselves that we can muster.