The Solar Eclipse at 19 Cancer of July 11, 2010

  

 Total Solar Eclipse - source: NASA

 
When someone says Cancer is about life's 'basics,' most of us think about where we live (home, real estate), what our life is based on (lifestyle, family, culture, heritage, nationality, upbringing)...and who we go about being (habits) even when we don't realize it (subconscious).

Those are indeed all very Cancer things, and tomorrow's Solar Eclipse in Cancer signals that some of these 'basics'...at least how we experience them...is in flux.

The Sun itself is giving us some metaphysical input - at this moment, there's sunspot number 1087 which is growing like a weed (okay, so that would be one seriously crispy weed...) But according to a report released just today from the folks at spaceweather.com, this sunspot is so active that come tomorrow, eclipse chasers may actually be able to witness explosions jettisoning huge amounts of solar material (energy) into the cosmic coronal sky.

For that, we will have to wait for the photos. But considering how astrology regards the corona, there may be some fascinating conjectures to be discovered in days to come. Like I say - for that, we have to wait.

In saying this, it's worth remembering yet again that any solar eclipse as seen from Earth is truly an 'earthly' event - 90% of the astrology you hear about is geo-(Earth)-centric(centered). In many senses this is why astrology should be treated more like a metaphysical science than anything else - we are looking at moments in unfolding time as the flow of time/space (energy, celestial magnetics, etc.) unfolds as they affect us here on Earth. We aren't looking at the universe as a whole - we're looking at the solar system and cosmos vis-a-vis Earth using wisdom drawn from data accumulated over literally thousands of years. 

It's as if astrologers are saying "1+2 equaled 3 back then, so 1+2 will equal 3 again this time around." In essence, that's exactly what science does - it replicates data and predicts based on replicated data. So why is astrology so hard for so many to accept?

I suspect it's mostly a matter of three basic issue categories:

1. Those who would like to feel in charge (in both the secular and sacred realm) of the world really hate the idea there's anything bigger and more powerful than they are...particularly if they don't control it...and heaven forfend it should be freely available to everyone. In other words, social ignorance is the ruling class' bliss.

2. Since the advent of science, everybody has gotten in the habit of wanting everything to be proven and backed by data - a point of view which definitely has its pluses and minuses. I've blogged about this before (link if you dare to read that little tale...) but basically, though we don't know what gravity is (but accept that it makes water run down a hill) and though we don't know exactly how aspirin works (we'll take two anyway and hope our headache goes away) we draw the line at astrology. Why? See point #1.  

3. Up until recently, astrologers have done a seriously poor job of organizing themselves as a profession complete with proficiency and ethical practice exams. There is still a lot of arguing going on in the rank and file since many people were attracted to astrology because they didn't have to get a degree and a license and sign on for malpractice insurance and the like.

But never mind how you feel about that...let's get on to the eclipse at hand. The mechanics of an eclipse are the same as that of a New Moon: the Moon comes to a point where it lines up between Sun (life-will-consciousness) and Earth (reality - daily life). That happens every month.

So what makes the eclipse an eclipse? 

The answer to that question would be the Nodes of the Moon, aka the lunar nodes. And just what are lunar nodes? Nodes are where the Moon's orbit around Earth intersects the orbit of Earth around the Sun, like in this diagram...

diagram by Boots Hart, CAP

...and yes, any planet which has a moon (or moons) has planetary nodes. What's  metaphysically implied by a planet having more than one moon? Well, gosh...that's a whole other blog. And pure postulation. But which I'll be happy to muse about in public sometime during the next couple of days, if you like.

(Hey, after an eclipse an astrologer has to do something, right?) 

The meaning of the nodes is drawn from the idea that the Moon is Earth's 'personal' satellite. And one which provides us with light, but light which is 'reflected' - or in human metaphysical parlance, reflective....from which we draw part of our local Luna's emotional reputation, adding to that the whole Moon/tide thing, that the Moon's rotation actually pulls on Earth's inner liquid mantle and...you know, all like that.

As for the Sun, it represents life and light. And where life meets light on a philosophical basis we get....consciousness. The Sun is 'in your face,' and proactive (which may well argue for intellectual sunscreen, but that's a whole other thing) while the Moon is reflective and thus represents all things which are generated in reaction to something else - as, for instance, feelings are.

And where the Moon's orbit around Earth times the month, Earth's orbit around the Sun times the year. This is the classical micro/macro-cosmic image - in this case that of daily life against the whole of our life or life itself.

And where does our daily life (the errands, chores, routines, etc.) intersect with the greater scope of our life? It intersects that greater life in our relationship to our world, via our functionality in society and through interactions with those around us.

And that is the exact symbolism assigned to the lunar nodes.

So when Earth/mankind's lunar nodes (societal connections) get mixed up with the New Moon "start of something" equation, then we get an eclipse. But being that we are already in our life and living our life, that 'newness' isn't physical rebirth, it's more like being 'reborn' in our awareness of what (our) life is about. Much as what is implied by the French term 'le petit mort' (sexual orgasm as a 'letting go' of psycho-physical control, if even for a minute), when a solar eclipse aspects our chart with any degree of specificity it signals a 'letting go' or something we're used to living with or enduring. A tension, if you will - within ourselves. 

We all get so used to living with something which works 'well enough' without availing ourselves of our full potential. So along comes the eclipse and we eclipse the life we have lived up until then. That's what eclipses are all about.

What 'goes away' may be something we're very used to. Something we have depended on. Something we don't know even how to really live without.

And yet, because that thing was there - whatever it was - we weren't focused on working to become our better selves.

Good or bad, whatever the shift in life situation or necessity comes with an eclipse, that may be difficult to adjust to. But this infamously famous cycle (the 19 year Metonic (eclipse) cycle) is one which repeatedly forces us to renew our efforts on  personal growth.

Which yes, just proves how inertia-prone human beings really are. We like to think we're productive, but in the greater life/cosmic/karmic sense? Maybe not so much.

That tomorrow's eclipse is in Cancer - a water sign all about emotions - tells us that the shift will be one all about how we feel about our place in the world and our life in particular. Occurring in the 2nd decanate of Cancer identifies this as a change taking place in the very nature of those connections or activities which are made because of emotional need or habit.

As a degree, 19 Cancer is a complex melage: we want to understand what's going on simply because we can't know what our life's parameters are unless we do. And yet, there is some inability to understand fully - which brings us to the duration of an eclipse, that being 36 months (3 years.) Often we don't really know what an eclipse is really about. And we don't really recognize what it's about until nearly the end of the prescribed three year cycle.

Which yes, at the moment may feel just entirely and totally ugly.

There's also an element to 19 Cancer all about things you have designed for yourself and which you are doing (or have been doing) as a matter of personal dedication. To whatever degree and through whatever aspect this eclipse hits your chart you will
experience upheaval with regards to that design. The question of what to be dedicated to and 'what's right' comes up for grabs, and that's not comfortable.

To say nothing of what life is like when everyone is going through this self same process.

But that's what this moment is. And we may have no answers for what or why we've done what we've done - or even why it means so darn much to us. It just does - and when dealing with someone strongly aspected by this eclipse (you'll know, trust me!) it's wise to proceed with caution as they're likely to explode with all the energy of that sunspot if you threaten what they define as their core vulnerability.

Which is a highly important point: YOU don't get to define someone else's soft spot. Not ever - and particularly not at the moment! So take care. The metaphysician's prescription is to proceed with due kindness. Even undue kindness, lest an undue unkindness be done unto you!

The actual eclipse occurs at 19:34 to 19:42 (7:34 - 7:42PM) Greenwich, England (GMT) time...please adjust to your local time zone from there. It will be visible only in the southern Pacific region, but since astrology tracks many events connected with longitudinal positions corresponding to the apex points of any eclipse, those are interesting to note as well.

If you're interested in the geo-politics here, look up astrologer Bill Meridian. I hear he has a new book coming out - it'll probably be a goodie!

As for tomorrow's eclipse, it starts at 172 West in the South Pacific and ends in western Argentina (at longitude 71 West) - which otherwise corresponds to a start in far western Alaska and an end around Boston, Massachusetts as in this diagram:

And that's a big chunk of the globe, people!

(And yes, I will work on how to make bigger maps. I'm new to this blog thing.)

Anyway...just so we're on the same page about just how global and primal such an event can actually be, a last note: as I write and as you read, physicists are working on a new idea. Protons may actually be smaller than ever thought. (article) This data is coming out of Europe, where some heap big accelerators have been built in order to study what's known as QED (quantum electrodynamics). Very cool stuff (said the science geek).

But from that, here's the question...if protons are smaller, what is taking up all the space we used to think they occupy? 

And what does that say about the very nature of existence?

You know, YOUR existence? The very YOU of it all?

THAT's so very primal! When it gets down to contemplating whether, or how, or at what level we actually exist, that's about as bedrock emotional as it gets, don't you think?

And yes, it is uncomfortable. After all, if we are just so much more space and so much less reality of matter...

...that not only provokes us to want to know the truth and to learn how to live in all that new space in which we grasp what we cannot grasp. 

And that, my friend, is what it feels like to be eclipsed. Life eclipses us at every turn, no question.

And it will continue to do so because we humans are curious and ever-curious beings.


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Astronomy vs. Astrology: Two Sides of a Universal Coin

 

  A sunset photo of the Moon, Venus (at left) and 

ESO's Very Large Telescope platform

(photo credit: ESO/Y. Beletsky, April 2010)

The astrology we know today (western/tropical and Vedic) basically began back in ancient Babylon. As yet, there was no science - so astronomy. Not yet.

Astrology was as good as it got - and astrology was a natural way to think in that world where people were still so much a part of the land and at the mercy of its seasons and cycles. You needed to know when to plant and all that. So if Venus rising in a certain place meant the rain was on the way - that was a good thing to know. This shift in thinking had begun when and because people stopped wandering around, choosing instead to choose a place, put down roots and establish  'civilization' (Note please that I said civilization, not civilized). 

It was really one of the BIG steps in human history. Along with figuring out how to roast coffee and make chocolate, in my book. But hey...that may be just me.

As for astrology, its roots go back to about the 4,000 BCE mark, which was when Egyptians began using 'dog star' Sirius as a seasonal marker for tha all-important Nile flood which helped them not starve. And natal astrology? Natal astrology as we know it seems to have come into being somewhere around 700 BCE - in Babylon.

But science didn't start until philosophical early Greeks decided to separate fact from conjecture - a process which started around the year 500 BCE. And which yes, we might say is still being worked on today.

Or not worked on, depending.

Whatever on that score, 500 BCE seems to be about when Greeks like Herodotus started hitching up their togas to sit and have a little serious ponder over a plate of olives and feta cheese. Those Egyptians...they're SO into divination. There must be some facts behind what happens, no? 

And with the discarding of an olive pit and such pithy words, thus was science born.

But that's not to say that astrology was - or is - bunk. Far from it!

A year (maybe two) ago I had a little exchange of emails with one of the fabulous planet hunters at Caltech. If you haven't realized by now (either from what I write here or at Daykeeper Journal) I'm very into science - and more on that in a minute.

The guy I had this exchange with is named Mike Brown - who has a nifty circular (Mike Brown's Planets), and his own well deserved page on Wikipedia. 

(That's it for the links - I promise!)

Anyway, the point I made to the masterful Mike Brown is that back in Babylon, one of his ancestors was probably standing in the public square watching one of my ancestors rhapsodizing enthusiastically (and one hopes, eloquently) about the Moon and the tides. So I was standing there...as I had stood there so many times, and I said to myself....Moon....tides....Moon...tides. 

Moon...TIDES? YES, YES! MOON...TIDES! They're CONNECTED! 

At this, Mike's ancestor probably heaved a heavy sigh. Oh how looney is SHE? 

Of course by now we know that the Moon does influence Earth's tides. It just took science a couple of thousand years to catch up. So just because we don't know how something works doesn't mean it doesn't work.

But science is catching up. A year or two ago now, someone lovable scientific type (I think they were connected with Hawaii's Keck telescope team, but maybe not...)....he proposed an experiment regarding Relativity.

You know, that Einstein thing.

Now don't go rolling your eyes at me...I'm not going all obscurely scientific and dense here. Basically the idea is that the speed of light has been calculated. That's a 'known.' And Relativity says that large objects (say, a planet...or even better, a star) have such giant mass and gravity (and maybe even gravitas?) that they can literally bend the path of light and thus alter the apparent speed of light. 

So...how to test this? Well, since we have this handy-dandy star (the Sun) hanging around out there, this science type proposed 'bouncing' a laser beam off Mercury just when the relative positions of Earth, Sun and Mercury would make the straight line between Earth and Mercury zip barely past the very, very, hot edge of said Sun. Theoretically, this should make the light bend, since we KNOW how super gigundo the Sun is (and if you don't know, check yesterday's blog photo).

So okay...there's a pow-wow, the experiment gets approved, the distance from Earth to Mercury (and back) gets calculated and translated into light-time - then at the appropriate moment, the experiment is begun.

And....voila! The Sun's super-deluxe mass did indeed 'bend' the light beam, increasing the amount of time it took that laser to hit Mercury and - 'boing!' - bounce back to Earth.

But what this proves astrologically, and that it proves an astrological premise thousands of years old? That's a whole other thing! And also true!

What do I mean? I mean that the exact moment of that experiment - with it's positioned line-of-site between Earth and Mercury just barely ootching past the Sun...That's what a Mercury station is. And the 'bend' in the light noted by the scientists is exactly what astrologers have been metaphorically saying about Mercury stations since....well, pretty much since ancient Babylon.

By the by here...Mike Brown doesn't dislike astrology. He just sees it as an 'inner' science....(at least so far. Though you never know...he may be reading this blog and be going maybe so...maybe so...) After our correspondence he made yet another comment about astrologers in his circular, saying that if you want information on human effects, that's astrology and not astronomy (in other words, don't ask him).

But that he isn't above your asking an astrologer a question is a substantial and large deal. And one which suggests that the real problem with astrology is that astrologers have themselves not taken the time and such to treat astrology as a science. We're getting there - and  we need to get there, because if E=mc2'd is a true-ism, then the universe seen and unseen is contiguous. You, me, the doorknob, dog star Sirius and planet Neptune, we are all made of the same stuff and at some very intrinsic level, a continuum.

To me, this makes the question of what makes us different not merely about DNA or molecular makeup but far more essential: how is it that we think we are separated and separate? To quote Yul Brynner in The King and I,  'tis a puzzlement.

People ask me about Pluto having been 'demoted' as a planet and I always respond with what one smart-ass astrologer came up with in the moment: who's going to tell Pluto?

Funny? Yes. But beyond that is the fact that astrology shouldn't ignore science. If the universe is contiguous (which it is), then all parts of our life are not only connected within us - hence why our mentality affects our health and vice versa. But it becomes even more than that. If the universe is contiguous, then it's completely logical to see time/space evolution in generational connections and individual lifetimes in positions of what would therefore be the clockwork manifesting of Existence: the planets and every other manner of celestial object.

And if that is true, each and every piece of that Existence - including the spacing of and all such - has meaning in itself, and to us. What it is, how it works, its cycles, its composition, its rotation, and its associations with other objects is not just valid, it's important.

This is why when I write about objects like Typhon, Sisyphus and Damocles (okay, so I wasn't done with the links...) ...when I consider or write about them, I take into account their physical nature and whatever their cycles and orbital paths tell us. If a Kuiper Belt object comes in as far as Uranus but not as far as Saturn, that says something. If Neptune as a planet controls the orbits of certain objects (the Plutinos) but not others (KBOs and SDOs) that means something. 

Astrology should care - because to not care is not just to ignore facts about objects out there in space, but to also not care about our lives and existence as human beings.

That's the other side of nature being totally contiguous: the responsibility which goes with being an astrologer - or human being - rests with us.