March 5, 2024 | by Silvianne K. Delmars |
On March 8 Venus meets with the Moon in the morning sky at 26 Aquarius 08, marking her arrival at the 7th gate (associated with the 1st or Root Chakra) in her Leo synodic overstory descent journey. Let’s take a look at the Sabian and Chandra symbols for this Aquarius 27 degree.
Venus
Sabian Symbol
Aquarius 27, by Ruby Fumizki with kind permission
“An ancient pottery bowl filled with fresh violets.
Keynote: The importance of traditional skills and artistic values deeply rooted in man’s instinctive feelings as frames of reference for one’s most authentic emotions.
This symbol contrasts with the preceding one just as personal reticence and a simple love of natural beauty contrast with the rush, gaudiness and intellectual efficiency characterizing so much of our modern existence. Violets have often been considered symbols of modesty and humility – values which were understood to be the mark of true womanhood … long ago, it seems!
In this symbol we see pictured the dependence of the purest feelings of natural living upon the traditions within which they find their most adequate and effective setting. It is a symbol of DELICACY OF FEELING.”
– Dane Rudhyar, from An Astrological Mandala: The Cycle of Transformations and Its 360 Symbolic Phases
Chandra Symbol
“A man laying stones for a path.
He is given a task, an assignment. He lives to fulfill this special destiny path. All he has to do is stay with his own truth sense and not be distracted by what people say and do when they are idle or caught in onlooker consciousness. His is activating, mobilizing, and he must participate, do what is in him, not talk about it, think about it, worry about it, or explain anything to anybody…
His example is that of what happens when you forget, you go the wrong way, and then you begin to wake up within the collective frequencies of doubt, confusion, and disconnection. Because he is just like everybody else, just as susceptible and impressionable to distraction, diverting energies and consciousness, he is also one who can lead forward from there in an accessible and easy-to-relate-to fashion…
All of this amounts to a sequence of lessons in succumbing to temptation while knowing better. Instead of this pattern being sad and wasteful, it is actually mainline collective-evolution focused. Leading lost souls takes some getting lost in order to work it out.”
– Ellias Lonsdale, from Star Sparks: 360 Windows into the Heart of the Zodiac
Quiet Potent Simplicity
I love the quietly potent simplicity of both of these images, showing up here at the Root Chakra gate. In what ways have we strayed from our true soul’s path, distracted by the false opinions and schemes of consensus reality instead of staying tuned to our most basic inner compass? What is blocking us from fully accessing the purity of our own authentic perception, keeping us from fostering and being nourished by the simple, earthy beauty all around us? Can we find the courage to forgive ourselves, and return our steps once again to our true soul’s path, no matter how often or how far we may wander from it?
Her Onward Journey
Venus will enter Pisces on March 11 and traverse the entire sign before making her last morning star conjunction with the Moon in very early degrees of Aries on April 7. Along the way she will meet up with both Saturn and Neptune, the quintessential initiators, respectively, of creating boundaries and of dissolving them.
What a poignantly synchronistic setup, as the Sacred Feminine, in her death and rebirth journey to enliven our individual and collective understanding of archetypal Leo, is experiencing the initiation of Pisces surrender, at the gate of essential life force. She is asked to surrender who she thought she was, cherished ideas of where she belongs, all false ego boundaries – all that has kept her from ecstatic union with the divine. An excruciating journey for solar-fueled, exuberantly enthusiastic, outwardly focused Leo – but a necessary one in her quest for an even more deeply rooted experience of self love.
The Sabian Symbol for Pisces 13, where Venus meets with Saturn on March 21, is “An ancient sword, used in many battles, is displayed in a museum.” Dane Rudhyar reminds us, “wherever found, this symbol emphasizes the imperative need to make use of the will in meeting the basic challenges of the inner life as well as outer adversaries.” For me, it always invokes The Lord of the Rings, and Aragorn’s inner struggle to take up the sword of his ancestors and the responsibilities that come with it, as well as the tales of Excalibur and King Arthur.
After this Saturn initiation of right use of will, Venus will go on to encounter Neptune on April 3 at the exact Pisces 28 degree. The Sabian symbol is “A fertile garden under the full moon reveals a variety of full-grown vegetables.” From Dane Rudhyar: “What is stressed now is… the moon’s power to call forth the instinctive urge for growth; many things respond in many different ways.” This is a symbol that speaks to the possibility of abundance, of having our basic needs met in a beautiful, complete way, as we allow ourselves to be fertilized by the numinous light of Piscean Oneness and unleash the primal creative power inherent in Great Mystery.
Mars
Turning now to Mars, we find him continuing his ascent in the morning sky, having passed Venus as she completes her final stages in the descent towards the Underworld. He is in the Rebirth and Growth of Wisdom stage in his 26-month Gemini synodic overstory cycle. This month, he conjuncted the Moon on March 7, just before this 7th Venus Moon gate, at 18Aquarius34. The Chandra Symbol for this Aquarius 19 degree is “Loud crushing noises as a glacier moves.”
Ellias Lonsdale elaborates: “Inevitability. Once events are set in motion, they will continue upon their course ineluctably. Karma works this way. We reap what we have sown. We are in the path of immense forces of a collective kind, and we are going to be pulverized by these forces over and again until we are able to create something new and different.” The Sacred Masculine is being asked to incorporate the Aquarian skill of being the detached observer while also taking seriously the situation he finds himself in, “to be half consumed and half thrown free.” The forces ranged against him feel overwhelming, until he finds, against all odds, the internal freedom to choose his own experience and shift the pattern to create something new.
Mars will make a second conjunction with the Moon on April 5, just before the next Venus Moon gate on April 7. The Sabian symbol for this degree, Pisces 12, “In the sanctuary of an occult brotherhood, newly initiated members are being examined and their characters tested,” speaks strongly of the imperative for the Sacred Masculine to prove himself, to assume responsibility for the ideals he has committed to. As Dane Rudhyar states, “He is no longer seeking; having found his place, he must prove himself able to fulfill the function associated with it. He is no longer ‘free’ as an individual, for he has become a part of an integral Whole operating under structural principles of immense antiquity.”
Like Venus, the Sacred Masculine in his quest for a fuller embodiment of airy, foot-loose-and-free, mind-inspired archetypal Gemini is being deeply initiated as he finds himself lost in the mystical Piscean fog of unknowing. Similar to the picture painted above by the symbol for Venus’ encounter with Saturn, his ability to find his way, and wield his sacred will for the creation of a new Earth, sourced in the power of ancient wisdom, is being invoked and tested. What new visions are waiting for him in the mists?
The Asteroid Goddesses
I find it worth a mention that Venus, who met with Ceres back in January during the 5th gate, is making a significant aspect to the other three major asteroid goddesses as she traverses this 1st gate of primal life force. As if she is being confronted with all the ways in which we have experienced the tortured, fragmented aspects of the sacred feminine life force, split from wholeness during the last few thousand years of dominator culture.
Venus in Pisces will square Pallas in Sagittarius on March 18, highlighting ways in which we may have felt forced to choose between intimate relating and creative accomplishment. The very next day, Venus will oppose Juno in Virgo, pointing to possible conflicts between our experience of ecstatic union with the divine and our ability to show up responsibly in real world relationships. Finally, Venus enters Aries on April 4 or 5 (depending on time zone) and on April 6 will square Vesta in Cancer (just the day before the 8th gate portal opens). In what ways has the Sacred Feminine (in both men and women) felt forced to choose between our pioneering, spontaneous, adventurous spirit and the desire to also be a lovingly nurturing presence, tending the sacred hearth fires of home and family.
Only by recognizing and grieving the very real losses and aberrations of behavior engendered by the forced assumption of these false dichotomies can we finally stitch together the fractured pieces of our inner and outer Sacred Feminine into a whole new tapestry. Suffused with this wholeness, in concert with the restored Sacred Masculine, we may at last find the core strength and inspiration required to seed a new future, for ourselves and humanity.