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Star Logic (Astrology)The Zodiac
Let's take a look today at 'star logic' (astro-logy). Our present north star, Polaris, is only one in a series of stars which play the role of pole star over the 26,000 year Great Year, or precessional cycle. I have also spoken at length about issues of male-female polarity as a spiritual background to contemporary issues. Is it accident, then, that we call our north, or 'guiding star', Polaris? Or is it some kind of intuitive reflection that issues of polarity are the key to understanding our present world. Consider that the previous north star was Alpha Draconis, in the constellation of Draco, the Dragon. Our contemporary dragon mythologies reflect that era, and when we depict the dragon as being slain by a knight (night) perhaps named St. George (geo-urge, or earth movement), we are essentially referring to an era when the dragon, which is fundamentally a group soul or collective identity, gave way to the need to individualize, to experience life as individual 'quest' - 'knight errant' or personal unconscious separating from the collective (to use somewhat Jungian language). Guided by 'the dragon', we are absorbed in the tribal identity. Under Polaris (polarity), however, we separate into male and female poles, then further into separate individuals. As the 'north star' rotates later into the constellation of Cygnus, the Swan, we will hopefully emerge from our 'ugly duckling' period of "man against man, man against woman, man against god, god against man - a strange religion" (as D. T. Suzuki once described Christianity) into our 'swan', or adult period, in which we are able to integrate our sense of the collective soul with our individual uniqueness. This progression is a part of the 'star logic' described by the names - Dragon, Polarity, Swan - which we, or our 'mysterious ancestors', have chosen. Let me give further examples of 'star logic' describing the evolution of humanity as a whole. Although astrological predictions can be found going back to the beginnings of recorded language, early charts were cast only for 'the king', on the assumption that the fate of the tribal leader was the fate of the tribe as a whole. This reflected the transition from the Age of Taurus (tribe as a whole) to Aries (individual leader). Only toward the end of the Aries Age do we find the first charts for individuals as individuals. Which corresponds to the traditional association of the sign Aries with the expression of the idea 'I am'; or, I separate from the whole, I individualize. Aries is also traditionally associated with Mars (Greek Ares), or War - for separation creates comparison, competition, conflict. In the Age of Aries individual 'world conquerors' began to emerge: Sargon, Nebuchadnezzar, Darius, Alexander, Caesar. This reflected the emerging idea that not only the tribe, but an ever more inclusive territory should be governed by a dominant individual. But, as the individual soul has emerged from the collective, the collective soul remains the underlying reality. And that underlying universal consciousness returns as the theme of the Age of Pisces - the 'Great Sea', in which the 'fish' (as individuals, Aries; as schools or groups, Taurus) 'live and move and have our being'. Pisces is a 'spiritual age' because it emphasizes the universe of possibility from which concrete individuals and things emerge, and into which they must eventually resubmerge themselves. How to reconcile these two ideas of individual and universal was the theme of the Aries-Pisces cusp. The attempted answer: a single individual (Christ) who is meant to be a spiritual world conqueror, rather than the physical world conqueror of Aries. 'Christ' supplants 'Caesar'. The relation of a physical human 'Jesus' to a spiritual 'Christ' is something I will explore in a future piece. For now, our subject is the 'star logic' of changing ages, and its relevance to our present world. Just as the Aries idea had to fold into the Pisces idea, so now the Pisces idea seeks a meeting with the Age of Aquarius. For our purposes, we can speak of Aquarius as the 'individuated collective'. To exemplify, let us use the present situation in Afghanistan. Under the older Aries idea, warlords fought for domination of the country. (Their status as individual leaders is Aries; their position as leaders of tribal or ethinc groups reflects the still earlier Taurus idea.) Then the warlords are swept away by the Taliban, who express the attempt to impose a universal religious code - Pisces. Now the warlords return, but under the scrutiny of world attention they are being told they must form a coalition government which respects the rights of minorities, including women, and offers representation to all groups. This ideal, a collective of variant individuals, is Aquarian. Whether the new government can succeed, or even be formed, the motives of its leaders and other 'interested parties', we put aside for the moment. Our purpose is simply to see the underlying logic - in the hope that, by keeping our 'eye on the prize', our clarity of vision will eventually produce the kind of open multi-valued societies we seek for ourselves, our own nation, and our world. With this kind of star logic we can also discern some patterns that aren't going to work, that belong to the past: the hegemony of a single super-power; salvation through charismatic leaders; world unity under a single dominant religion. In addition, if our fundamentalists of whatever stripe - Christian, Muslim, Jewish, Hindu, New Age - try to tell us that a 'Great Avatar', 'Messiah', or 'Buddah' is about to appear to lead us to freedom, we can reply that they're a couple thousand years out of phase. The only current 'messiah' on the scene to do the job is us. Collectively. One more example of star logic: discovery of the outer planets. The solar system as it was generally known up until the late 18th century ended with the furthest of the visible planets, Saturn. Saturn in star logic traditionally denotes timing, structure and limits. The other inner 'planets', including sun and moon, symbolize the various functions of personal life. If Jupiter, 'the teacher', were depicted as a teacher in a school, that would make Saturn in effect 'the principal' - a detached figure of impersonal authority, setting the limits beyond which personal reality (the students) dare not go. How then to designate the implications of the invisible and 'transpersonal' outer planets Uranus, Neptune and Pluto? If we were to think of humanity as a whole as having been 'in school', in effect still in its 'teenage' period, then the discovery of the outer planets would correspond to the beginnings of young adulthood. Uranus, a planet of 'exploration and discovery', related also to electiricy and technology, would be 'masculine', and a first exhuberant rush into freedom and consequent responsibility. Neptune, reflecting dreams and connection to the greater universe, or 'great sea', is then more 'feminine' and universalizing. While Pluto symbolizes 'the Dark' or 'Unerworld' - a confrontation with the fused male-female energies of creation itself. Or, put another way, Pluto is the death of personal reality subsumed into that of the Soul. Thus, for humanity, the beginning of spiritual adulthood. Is it accident or co-incidence that these
discoveries occur on the cusp, not only of a 'New Age'
or 'Great Month of the Great Year', but of what is
actually an entirely new (26,000 solar year) Great
Year? Or is this period of crisis a 'coming of age'
for the human race? And, if so, who were the 'parents
and teachers' who planned it for us?
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