Archive for March, 2023

Vernal Equinox – March 20, 2023, 21:25 UT

Tuesday, March 21st, 2023

New Moon in Aries – March 21, 2023, 17:23 UT

A new astrological year begins, and what a start we will have! The Sun entered Aries on March 20, and the New Moon in the first degree of Aries follows on the next day. Pluto enters Aquarius on March 23, 2023. The New Moon is in conjunction with Neptune and Borasisi in late Pisces and with Mercury and Manwë in early Aries.

New Moon in Aries

Saturn changed signs already earlier in this month, and now it is Pluto’s turn. Pluto’s ingress is a slow process though. It will retrograde back to Capricorn in June, re-enter Aquarius again in January 2024, retrograde back to Capricorn again, and do the final ingress into Aquarius in November 2024. There are some interesting minor planet ingresses in progress too, namely those of Borasisi into Aries and Sedna into Gemini.

The trans-Neptunian Manwë is newly arrived in Aries. The ingress took place at the end of January. Manwë is actually a multiobject system, a contact binary consisting of Manwë and Thorondor, surrounded by rapidly orbiting moonlets. According to the official naming citation, “In J. R. R. Tolkien’s mythology, Manwë is foremost among the deities who rule the world. Manwë takes special responsibility for the air and winds. He resides in the Undying Lands across the western ocean from Middle Earth. For intelligence of events in Middle Earth, Manwë relies on the kingdom of eagles led by Thorondor.” The wise eagles were Manwë’s messengers. Tolkien wrote that Manwë “sees further than all other eyes, through mist, and through darkness, and over the leagues of the sea.”

Mercury too was the messenger of the gods. Mercury represents thoughts, speech, and communication. Mercury conjunct Manwë in Aries can mean forceful and direct communication, paying attention to details, whereas Borasisi and Neptune in Pisces can blur the message.

Neptune and Borasisi have a couple of things in common. They both were discovered exactly in the same degree at 25+ Aquarius, though 153 years apart. Neptune was discovered in 1846 and Borasisi in 1999. Deception and lies are the negative traits that are associated with Neptune. The trans-Neptunian Borasisi is named after the sun in the cosmogony of Bokononism described in Kurt Vonnegut’s novel Cat’s Cradle. The foundation of the fictional religion of Bokononism is based on living by the untruths that make one happy. The ingress of Borasisi into Aries starts in May and is completed in January 2025. Neptune and Borasisi will meet each other in the same degree at 2+ Aries in the summer of 2025, but their exact conjunction does not occur until in May 2026.

Last but not least is Sedna’s ingress into Gemini. Sedna, the primary symbol for climate change, enters Gemini for the first time in June, returns into Taurus in November, and then re-enters Gemini in April 2024. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) just published its report yesterday. Quoting the UN secretary general, António Guterres: “This report is a clarion call to massively fast-track climate efforts by every country and every sector and on every timeframe. Our world needs climate action on all fronts: everything, everywhere, all at once.”

Full Moon in Virgo – March 7, 2023, 12:40 UT

Tuesday, March 7th, 2023

The Full Moon in Virgo occured on March 7, 2023, 12:40 UT. Saturn entered Pisces practically at the same time, only at about an hour later. In Pisces the Sun is in the same degree with centaur Nessus. In tight conjunction with them is asteroid Medusa. The Sun is sextile Uranus in Taurus.

Full Moon in Virgo

Nessus was discovered in 1993 and named from Greek mythology after the centaur who tried to rape Heracles’s wife. The orbital period is over 122 years. Nessus orbits the Sun mainly between Saturn and Neptune, but sometimes crosses the orbit of Pluto too, so we can say that it links not only the realms of Saturn and Neptune, but also that of Pluto. Saturn (structures) and Pluto (renewal) are both changing signs now. Saturn just entered Pisces and Pluto is going to enter Aquarius on March 23 for the first time on this round.

Abuse of power, oppression, helplessness, and revenge are themes linked with Nessus, and the patterns can stretch beyond generations. The transits of Nessus can be painful, but they help to discover those patterns, and healing can occur when there is no more need to ”pass the buck”.

149 Medusa is a small main-belt asteroid discovered in 1875, and named after the Gorgon Medusa, a snake-haired monster in Greek mythology. Asteroid Medusa was discovered in Pisces quite near its current location.

In mythology Medusa was a terrible monster who could turn men to stone. She was beheaded by the hero Perseus, who gave her head to Pallas Athena as a shield. Originally Medusa was a beautiful maiden and represented the female wisdom. Along with the rise of patriarchy the image changed, and the serpent-haired Medusa is now widely seen as the symbol of feminine rage.

Quoting astrologer Demetra George: ”Medusa represents our serpent wisdom energy arising from our instinctive sexuality which we can transform into our powers to create, regenerate, and recognize truth.”

The current Sun-Nessus-Medusa conjunction is exactly conjunct the lunar nodes of the Islamic Republic of Iran (Apr. 1, 1979, 15:00 IRDT -4:30, Teheran, Iran). We have recently seen the horrific news, how more than 1000 schoolgirls in Iran have been poisoned since November. The aim is to frighten the girls from going to school, or possibly a revenge because girls have been protesting and removing their hijabs after Masha Amini’s death in the morality police’s custody in last September. This is the first time since the Islamic Revolution in 1979, that schoolgirls have been joining the protests in Iran.

After public anger, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has called the poisonings as an unforgivable crime and that those who are guilty should be punished. The White House has called for an independent investigation. We shall see how things will develop in Iran.

Chart of the Islamic Republic of Iran