A Merry Christmas New Moon and the Magi

 

A New Moon at 1 degree of Capricorn graces our skies on the 23rd December, very close to the Winter Solstice, when the Sun reaches maximum declination south at mid-day. For three days, the Sun will 'reside' in this space, 23.15 degrees declination south, and then begin its return to the north. Of course, the Sun does not move, it is Planet Earth which is dancing around the Sun and 'wobbling' as it does so, and that 'nodding' to the Sun gives us the seasons. 

A few interesting observations about this New Moon is the movement of Jupiter into the warrior sign of Aries, urging us to use the wisdom gained by its sojourn in Pisces (where it had retrograded into for a few months) and put our plans into action. Jupiter, in ancient astrology, represented the Crown Prince. Bernadette Brady writes extensively about Assyrian astrology and has a wonderful article over here (just copy and paste this link into a search engine -  https://zyntara.com/the-prince-takes-the-crown-the-1000-year-cycle-of-saturn-jupiter-and-the-full-moon/ ). Saturn was the sign of the King. What happens when Jupiter and Saturn are together in the sky? Herein lies the Christmas Story with the Three Kings. 

Image: Martin Mutti, Astronomical Image Data Archive

The Gospel of Matthew makes mention of three 'kings' following a star in the east, whilst Luke's Gospel focuses on the birth of Jesus in a lowly manger. Put together, we have the narrative of three 'wise men' - the magi - bearing gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. Learned academics have written about the three stars in the Belt of Orion - Alnilam, Mintaka and Alnitak (see picture). At the moment, Orion is quite prominent in the night sky. Who were these three wise men, and why were they following the star in the east? 

The Assyrians were avid sky watchers. Their knowledge of astronomy and the stars (considered one science until The Age of Reason) was extensive and is still studied today. The coming together of the Crown Prince (Jupiter) and the King (Saturn) in the sky was an event much heralded by the priest-astrologers and would have been seen as a huge star (don't we put one at the top of our Christmas trees?). In 7BC, there were three conjunctions of Jupiter and Saturn in the sign of Pisces. This is a cycle which takes around eight centuries to recur. They equated the sign of Pisces with Israel, Jupiter and Saturn together spoke of a great king and they understand that this event would take place in Israel, specifically Jerusalem. 

Spring forward to the 17th Century, the German astronomer Johannes Kepler wrote an article about the Star of Bethlehem, placing the event somewhere between 7 - 5 BC. Just for your information, Galileo and Kepler are the two giants Newton's work rests on, that's how learned Kepler was (look up his life story - very interesting). 

Back to the New Moon at 1 degree of Capricorn; this is the month associated with stablity and pragmatism (think mountain goat - careful but endeavouring). Two planets and the Moon in this New Moon chart are out-of-bounds (beyond the 23.15 degrees declination) and therefore are wild cards. Mars, currently doing its apparent 'backwards' walk is in Gemini - restraint with words here, if you please. Venus is in Capricorn, so networking will be based on pragmatism - but being oob (out-of-bounds) and also trine Uranus, you may see this being played out as trying to 'set free' accepted norms of networking with others. Venus is also conjunct Mercury, so this adds a good degree of warm to communication. Then there's the Moon; an oob Moon gives a vibe of 'not-fitting-in', or even taken literally, when your emotions are out-of-bounds/taboos. We may see some taboos being broken nationally and worldwide. 

I hope you found this blog entry interesting. Keep well, keep safe and enjoy doing what you are doing. Time is too short to waste it on unnecessary chores. 

Blessings, 

Cindy