- Signs, Sabian Symbols, and What It All Means -

This article covers significant aspects, degree symbols, and other important factors in this New Moon chart. This is a transformational and educative New Moon, so get clear about the plan, order things so they function efficiently and economically, be clear about who or what you serve, and show tender care for the projects you’ve begun.

The second decan of Virgo is where we take our light and divine discernment into the world, seeing how to make everything work better. This is the next step in the new Aquarian process which is unfolding. What began in that sign led us to letting go of the old with as much compassion as we could generate (Pisces), then leaping into “the future in the making” (Aries). We grounded it and “made it real” (Taurus) which led to the ten thousand possible ways it applies and does not apply (Gemini). We then made personal adjustments in our response to that Aquarian ideal in Cancer, brought the Aquarian energy to surface in Leo, and now need to eliminate and/or reorganize the details to serve the greater whole.

Long Term Effects of the Capricorn and Aquarius Compressions

We began multiple long wave Capricorn cycles in early 2020, and created more long wave Aquarian cycles between March and December 2020. If you want to know more about the four year sequence of The Great Compressions of Early 2020, 2021, and 2022, that article explains that in January through March 2020 we experienced the second of four consecutive compressions of planets. The first was in early 2019 when all the planets were bundled in about one third of the sky, called a Bundle pattern, which is the rarest of all. While this expanded after that, we again hit maximum compression again in March 2020, and then expanded through the rest of the year.

This clustering happened again this year in the last half of January into early February, with maximum compression was around January 19-21 when all of the planets were within a 101 degree span, creating a very intense zone of activity wherever we have late Capricorn through early Taurus. Four planets in Aquarius and two in Taurus made for a very crowded house, with 10 distinct energies occupying less than 1/3 of the total space. The final compression will occur in early 2022.

Depending on the position of the Moon and the inner planets relative to the outer planets, different months bring us different Jones Patterns. These patterns operate their own independent influence, regardless of which planet is in which sign.

Currently, the outer planet occupied span begins with Pluto in late Capricorn, and proceeds through Saturn and Jupiter in Aquarius, Neptune in Pisces, and ends with Uranus in Taurus. (We don’t include TransPluto, since Jones didn’t use it in defining his patterns). Now that the inner planets are in Virgo and Libra, they are past the “the far side” of the outer planet span, with only oppositions to Uranus coming except for the Sun opposed Neptune in about a week.

In this chart, we have a distinct cluster of the inner planets between mid-Virgo and late Libra, with huge gaps between the inner planet cluster and the outer planet span, creating a classic “See Saw” Jones pattern. Due to transits, the patterns change frequently at this time. While there are elements of a “Locomotive” pattern in play, the open spans are very wide (88+ degrees on one side and 120 on the other), with one axis of opposition involving Virgo/Pisces (two if you count Mercury opposed Chiron).

So What is a “Seesaw Pattern” and how does it work?

This type of spread, with two or more planets on one side of the map and the others on the other side of the map, with one or more oppositions defining the axis of awareness, creates a “Seesaw” Jones Pattern. Where a Seesaw pattern is present, stay focused and balanced at the center while taking note of the periphery of things, and don't get off on a tangent or limb.

This pattern shows a need to be able to see both sides of any given thing, especially where there are opposing trends or views. The strength is in an ability to triangulate to angles of approach beyond the polarity that allows for progress and understanding.

As Marc Jones put it, “it reveals a less-sharpened but much more definite balancing of life emphases at opposing or contrasting points in experience. It is a persistent move to a balance which is apt to give a characteristic rhythm… The indication is not so much an uncertainly of action, or reaction, as a tendency to act at all times under a consideration of opposing views or through a sensitiveness to contrasting and antagonistic possibilities.”

He continues “the Seesaw temperament has its existence in a world of conflicts, of definite polarities. It is capable of unique achievement, through a development of unsuspected relations in life, but it is also apt to waste its energies through its improper alignment with various situations.”

He states that the ideal will show oppositions around the middle of the opposing “planetary aggregates” (clusters) and that axis will be the “focal determinator.” But, “if no such emphasis is present, the life tends to be significant at the side of the greater number of planets, or sometimes where they are concentrated most closely.”

As the oppositions between the Lunation in Virgo and Neptune in Pisces is the primary “tension of opposites,” that is the focus of the Seesaw tendencies. The houses where this falls will be the source of tension and greater awareness.

The Outer Planets Anchor the Pattern In A Third of the Sky

During 2018, 2019, and 2020, Jupiter played a major part in entering life experience because it was the planet leading the span. It’s why those years seemed like a wild ride, an adventure, a quest, and more! These years prepared us for the forceful awakening happening now during this time of great mobilization.

In 2020 Jupiter entered the outer planet occupied span, and will be there for several years. Last year it made multiple conjunctions with Pluto, expanding and purifying that powerful energy wherever we have late Capricorn in our charts. After Jupiter’s third and final conjunction with Pluto in November, Pluto again leads the outer planet occupied span for years to come as that occupied span opens up after Jupiter conjuncts Uranus and moves into Gemini in 2024.

That means we’ll have “competing conjunctions” in the larger global tides, since those Capricorn conjunctions will be in play for quite a while, along with the 2020 Mars conjunct Saturn coupled with the Grand Mutation Jupiter conjunct with Saturn, both at 1 Aquarius. As you know, the Aquarian conjunctions launched a new 20 year and 200 year era moving from materialism to idealism, so take a look at how you reorganized or restructured your life in 2020, preparing to find power flowing to you and from you as we move into a vaster tide of evolution toward long term Aquarian wave forms.

In this New Moon, we have one extraordinarily intense occupied span involving Sun, Moon, Mercury, Venus, and Mars all within a 40+ degree span! As all the inner planets are between mid-Virgo and late Libra, that span will be very highly active these next 4 weeks.

The Sabian Symbol for the New Moon

A New Moon sets the seed forms for what the following month will demonstrate. This Lunation falls at 15 Virgo, and it is said that the second third (decan) of any sign deals with the social, emotional, and cultural levels of life, and being the second decan of Virgo it has a sub-influence of Capricorn with an added dose of Venus. While I've given you a sense of this degree up to now, this is where we go into depth.

The Sabian Symbol we’ve been given for the 15th degree of Virgo is “An ornamental handkerchief.” In the original notes from the Marc Jones class on the symbols published in The Astrology of Personality, Rudhyar says this is a degree of the “ultimate fineness of spiritual values shading into the spiritual,” “schooled and aristocratic delicacy,” and “cultured restraint.”

In The Astrological Mandala, he says this degree involves “the quintessence of deeds well done.” He states that those who have acted “with determination, courage, and discrimination while following in the footsteps” of those they admire and aspire to emulate will receive a prize for proving themselves. This is about not allowing the past to block our way, so that “the mystic Beloved” can offer us our “spiritual garment.”

He says this ends the scene of Characterization, offering us a symbol of “the ultimate validity of the many efforts of generations of (beings) toward the building of a beautiful and significant culture.” Here we can express the flower of our lineage, or become a blossom of our spiritual community. He says it falls in the span of Idealization, and it’s the fifth and final degree of the individual, mental, and spiritual level of the scene of Characterization in the Act of Stabilization.

According to Dr. Jones, creator of the Sabian Symbols, the degree is one of our “self-quickening desire for an allegiance to a reality higher or finer” that the one we’re experiencing. He states “The knight in theory at least could never enter the lists of chivalry without his lady’s bit of lace as a talisman of the spirit, and every normal person feels rather lost without some continual reminder of his better impulses.”

He goes on to say “objects therefore are of value as they preserve meaning and help perfect action. He offers us the keyword of GRACEFULNESS. He states that when operating in a positive manner, this degree is “an effective refinement of personal manner and a high achievement through an exceptional charm.”

So the specific theme of the next month involves forms of flowering in our material and spiritual lives. Be dedicated to a higher reality, and find your “totem” that will serve as a reminder that you are on a quest of refining the best in each situation that arises. Live your integrity in a precise way, and your will become the flower of consciousness in your world. This fulfills a form of Divine Discernment, and leads to educational experiments.

Important Aspects

Remember that in reading a Lunation chart (as well as a horary, inceptional, electional, or any event chart) the forming aspects show things to come, while separating aspects show things already past. Partile separating aspects show what’s been going on in the Now. This section covers only forming and partile separating aspects.

As mentioned, we are now just past the midpoint of a season of the inner planets opposing the outer planets. We’re done with the oppositions to Pluto, Saturn, Jupiter and most of the oppositions to Neptune, but because of where the planets are right now, oppositions continue to natal planets we may have in late Cancer, Leo, late Virgo, mid-Scorpio, Pisces, and Aries.

We’re still in a time of relatively few, but very significant aspects between the planets! While the Saturn square Uranus friction will pervade the atmosphere all year and beyond, right now it’s waning until the coming squares to Saturn and oppositions to Uranus during the transits in Scorpio. The big news in this Lunation is Venus trine Jupiter and the multiple favorable Earth trines made by the Sun and Moon conjunct and all working together to trine both Uranus and Pluto.

The Lunation is vigintile Mercury, novile Venus conjunct Mars, quadranovile Jupiter, biquintile Saturn, exactly trine Uranus, widely opposed Neptune, and widely trine Pluto. Other aspects include Mercury sesquisquare Jupiter, quadranovile Neptune, and biseptile Pluto; Venus is semisextile Mars, trine Jupiter, biseptile Saturn, quadranovile Uranus, biquintile Neptune, and square Pluto; and Mars is quincunx Jupiter, quadraelftile Uranus, and trine Pluto.

Outer planet aspects are numerous at this time. We see Jupiter vigintile Saturn, binovile Uranus, and semisextile Pluto; Saturn is trielftile Uranus and semisquare Neptune, and Uranus is septile Neptune and tredecile Pluto.

In a nod to Chiron, this shows the Lunation triseptile Chiron, Mercury opposed Chiron, and Jupiter semisquare Chiron. The one who mentors us into our higher self puts this time at “a fork in the road of excellence,” exteriorizing through the symbol of the kind professor.

Special Configurations in Evolutionary Astrology

This month there are three evolutionary configurations directly in play with two other powerful independent factors. The first involves the very widespread opposition, sextile, and trine configuration made by the Lunation, Mars, Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto. The Sun and Moon forming on Mars tightens the opposition and trine energy, with the Lunation in an exact trine to Uranus. This should give a practical harmony and stability, as well as clarity, innovating thinking, and efficiency.

Here we give a special note to the Lunation conjunct Mars. As the Sabian Symbols are extraordinarily excellent and all are weaving a gigantic Earth “field of energy,” this will be great for practical organization and/or reorganization of all kinds of things. The Sun and Moon conjunct Mars makes them also in “Earth trine” with Pluto, and re-activates the favorable connection between the Earth Mars and Earth Uranus.

This is very favorable for any planets we may have between 13-27 degrees of Taurus, Cancer, Virgo, Scorpio, Capricorn, and Pisces. You can see that favorably affects a VERY wide sector of the signs (and those zones don’t include all the quintiles to these planets, which opens up at least as many other sectors.)

The second configuration also involves the Lunation, this time in 9th harmonic (novile) series aspects with Venus trine Jupiter. The Lunation is novile Venus and quadranovile Jupiter with Venus quadranovile Uranus, opening up “spiritual realization zones” around 3-7 Aries, Leo, and Sagittarius, 13-17 Taurus, Virgo, and Capricorn, and 23-27 Gemini, Libra, and Aquarius. While there’s not a “Kite” focus, it still lights up four points of a “9-Pointed Star of Spiritual Realization.”

If you have something in these areas, prepare for long awaited revelations about the value of time and choice in bringing forth higher and broader awareness. This should contribute to the year theme of the Mercury retrogrades, all of which begin in late Air signs and retrograde back to the middle of those signs. As the Lunation and Venus make waning aspects to Jupiter, this is the beginning of the fulfillment of the Jupiterian promise which should be crystal clear in October when the Sun, Mars, and Mercury retrograde all tredecile Saturn, trine Jupiter and square Pluto.

The third configuration is of course the Grand Irrationality with Uranus septile Neptune. These two continue to anchor a seven pointed Star of Destiny whenever they’re in orb, indicating major choices and changes to any planets or points we may have near any of the 7 affected “hot zones” around 30 Capricorn-4 Aquarius, 21-25 Pisces, 13-17 Taurus, 4-8 Cancer, 25-29 Leo, 16-20 Libra, and 8-12 Sagittarius.

Explaining Harmonics

This month we have a wide variety of aspects, mostly harmonious without a lot of friction. In terms of the various harmonic series, this month is a mixed bag. In the specialization harmonic series, we have 1 vigintile, 2 quindeciles, 1 tredecile, and 3 biquintiles. As noted, the 9th harmonic gives us 2 noviles, 1 binovile, 3 trinoviles, and 3 quadranoviles, showing a heavy spiritual emphasis these next few weeks! All of these show factors disappearing or appearing, and all represent various stages in the 9 “pulses” of our ongoing revelation process.

The quadranoviles are an aspect of accepting and/or rejecting certain things based in what’s revealing itself in our spiritual life. Basically, the 9th harmonic indicates things which need to be put on the shelf for a while, or that which has been gestating can now move forward. If you want to know more about this important “spiritual gestation” series which mark points of potential spiritual realization and integration, there are several articles in the archives.

This month we have only 2 aspects in the 11th harmonic elftile series, these being 1 trielftile and 1 quadrelftile. In the nonrational septile series, we have 1 septile and 2 biseptiles. The 11th harmonic series indicate that faith is required to deal with transcending some dualities, and 7th harmonic aspects indicate forks in the road of destiny.

Mercury biseptile Pluto shows a culminative turning point in the Mercury/Pluto cycle this year, where seed forms will take a dramatic turn for the better and/or the worse. Given the degree symbols, it seems that we can find core understanding which will help us transform our lives and balance some things out via new perspectives. This will most impact people with planets or points near 9-13 Libra, 1-5 Sagittarius, 23-27 Capricorn, 14-18 Pisces, 5-9 Taurus, 26-30 Gemini, and 18-22 Leo.

Venus biseptile Saturn is also culminative, and pulls together the Pluto in Capricorn energy with the Saturn in Aquarius energy via the two planets in Libra. Because of Saturn’s Sabian Symbol, this is clearly a fork in the road of future destiny related to the “pre-formed patterns” of Saturn showing us things to come a few weeks from now. This is a point of choice and change relative to the year’s theme of 26 Libra, so this one shows us the transformative power of knowing how to alternate between “Yin” energy and “Yang” energy. This will most impact people with planets or points near 6-10 Aquarius, 27 Pisces-1 Aries, 19-23 Taurus, 11-15 Cancer, 3-7 Virgo, 24-28 Libra and 15-19 Sagittarius.

We have relatively few frictional aspects. The slight amount of friction is provided by Mercury sesquisquare Jupiter, Venus square Pluto, Mars quincunx Jupiter, and Saturn semisquare Neptune. Be calm as you turn the corner on old relationships. Sacrifice whatever you need to in order to calm your reflexive instincts, accept your “mantle of power” with grace, and see this begins the fulfillment of a promise.

The novile (9th harmonic), septile (7th harmonic) and elftile (11th harmonic) series all feature spiritual aspects. All novile series aspects represent gestative energies that can lead to great spiritual realizations. Septile series aspects represent forks in the road of destiny, while the elftile series aspects represent issues and points of evolution where we confront the need to resolve some sort of duality by making a leap of faith to attain a form of mastery over that type of duality. This series tests our faith.

The quintile and biquintile (5th harmonic) and related 10th (decile and tredecile), 15th (quindecile), and 20th harmonic (vigintile) aspects are all specialization aspects. You can find more by going to Astrology Class on the Specializing Aspects Pt. 1 – The Quintile and Biquintile, and Astrology Class on the Specializing Aspects Part 2 – The Decile, Tredecile, Quindecile and the Vigintile.

You can find out more about the spiritual aspects (septile, novile, and elftile series) by referencing this brief overview of the Spiritual aspects, complete with glyphs for all of them.

Element Balance and Who’s Leading the Sun

This month shows a wide imbalance in the elements, with Earth in excess. We have the 10 traditional planets occupying 6 signs in a skewed element distribution. We have 0 planets in Fire (inspiration and warmth), 5 planets in Earth (practical grounding, 1 in Water (feelings and experiencing), and 4 in Air (relatedness and communicating). This month we have Capricorn, Aquarius, Pisces, Taurus, Virgo and Libra represented, with no planet in the other signs.

Air and Earth are “cool” elements, while Fire and Water are “hot” elements. With this distribution, we are as cold as a mountaintop in Winter. There’s no fire to heat anything, so we’ll have to draw on that internally. The only water is the collective soup. With so much Earth and Air, it’s a time of practical ideas, communicating plans, and brainstorming about the best way to do things, combining innovation and practicality.

Because the New Moon falls in mid-Virgo with no planet in Cancer, Leo, or early Virgo, we again find Uranus is “the Gateway to the Light,” and will be until the Moon is again between late Taurus and early Virgo. All the ongoing “gentle revolution” to lead you into “character building experiences,” and show courage as you get out beyond the known and familiar.

The current sequence at present of Deciding, Feeling, and Thinking

We’ve been through several different sequences over the past few months. There are six patterns, and each has their strengths and weaknesses. We are now in a time of shifting patterns, and this Lunation continues the one in play since the last New Moon. As a process of moving through events, over the next 4 weeks the most effective “firing sequence” for approaching life and experience involves leading with our decisions and actions, followed by thinking, communicating, envisioning and finding a new view of things, and then feeling what we’ve done and seen.

This pattern leads with their decisions. They assess what needs to be done and then do it. Efficient, practical decisions and actions lead the way, followed by new information, new understanding, new vision, new communications, and new ways of interacting that helps us get clear about something.

Following this thinking function, we will need to reference our feelings and what we’re experiencing as a result of those insights, memories, understanding, or vision. After we decide or act and then think, we then need to go deep within to feel the implications of those ideas and visions. This is a highly effective pattern but tends to blow through experience without taking time to feel it.

So get it in gear, act on the facts at hand, and then go get new information or new ways of seeing things. After that, feel your feelings and check in about how you’re experiencing those thoughts, or that information or vision. Make a decision, get the view you need, and then name how and what you’re feeling. If you’re in doubt as to what to do, reference your feelings and not your ideas.

Summing Up

This New Moon in Virgo will help our communications and open the door to innovation, evolution, efficiency, and fulfillment of a phase of our transformational process. This is a great time to give and receive information which is useful and brings balance to things. Be gracious as you leave some things behind at a “before the beginning” fork in the road.

A few months back we got a broad view of our Brothers and Sisters who share our “Spiritual Mountaintop,” and how stand on a platform of knowing how to achieve a “transcendent security” in relatively comfortable ways. We also can be more thoughtful in our choices opening future group work and friendships, and many things will happen these next four weeks which will show us how to be as perfect as possible in administering group responsibilities.

Those who can understand the bigger trends are being lifted up as if on wings. We continue to review our process of “graduation into a new realm of Being,” now knowing the doors which opened beginning May 2020 have now shows us alternative futures and adventures to be embraced in December. With Jupiter still having one more transit through the Transfiguration Zone, we’re literally in the heart of a larger transformation process, so stay open to whatever you need to learn to become the Spiritual Adult who has emerged from their chrysalis.

While we still have to function within the Capricorn cycles we began in 2020, we also have crossed the threshold of an era unknown to humanity since the 13th and 14th centuries. Even then, we were still in the depth of the Age of Pisces, so the awakening of new ideas then were relative to the old era, whereas what’s coming involves wave after wave of Aquarian energies, pushing us to the coming Great Age emerging in the second half of this century.

As noted earlier, these long wave Aquarian pulses were initially set into motion by the Mars conjunct Saturn at 1 Aquarius on March 31, 2020, marking the initiation of archetypal Aquarian preliminary structures offered by Saturn. The promise and potential of the new Aquarian pulse then began to expand into a greater social and cultural vision beginning at the Jupiter conjunction with Saturn, the Grand Mutation of the Solstice also at 1 Aquarius. So we have 20 years of Aquarian energies set into motion by that conjunction!

Of note is that Mars will transit Aquarius in March and April 2022, giving a new impetus to the Aquarian structures which grow and take shape in 2021. After that, the next time Mars transits Aquarius will be in February and March 2024, when it conjuncts Pluto at 1 Aquarius in February about 3 weeks after Pluto’s first ingress into Aquarius. That begins the Pluto in Aquarius “generation” of the 21st century which lasts until 2043. As there will be a Jupiter conjunction with Pluto at 15 Aquarius in 2033, we’ll see the “expansion of the Angels of the Age of Aquarius” at that time.

We are all actively in a long term “metamorphosis” which is already opening a new adventure for all of us, with the final phase in November and December! Because the last two degrees of Aquarius show us what the beginning of the coming Age of Aquarius is about, last year helped us remember we are Beings of Light, a Superstar shining the Light of our Eternal Love into our world. This year expands that promise.

Last year’s Solar Eclipses have helped us all turn a Cosmic Corner and move in a new direction. We’ve “lowered one flag and raised a new one” and will continue to do so for many months and years. The “Cosmic Recycler” quality of the 2019 and 2020 Cancer eclipses are helping remove old habits and sentimentalities, and many things which used to be familiar patterns in our lives have ended, are ending, or will end.

Both the Cancer and Sagittarius eclipses of 2020 are removing all we do not need in our Cancer and Sagittarius response in the houses they fell in. The Sag Eclipse is removing all which blocks our happiness, and I’m certainly looking forward to the restoration of more humor, more freedom, more largeness of vision, and greater truths and futures promised as old obsolete Sag forms are taken away. June’s eclipse is removing old Gemini responses, and will purify our life and mind while repressed material comes up and claims its due.

New groups of Spiritual communities formed last year and will continue to form this year, and those which are Aquarian in nature are being “lifted on the wings of angels” in 2021. Trust the process. We are learning not to play to the generic confusion, irrationality, and misleading notions. Revolution is in the air! And when you find things and people of eternal worth, value them with all your heart.

Saturn: Spiritual Master, Spiritual Friend

Saturn continues its long term occupancy in its home sign of Aquarius. While we’ll still be dealing with the individual, mental, and spiritual levels of the group work set into motion last year, we have now entered a new quality of Saturn’s nature. In Aquarius, Saturn continues to be the final dispositor of all planets transiting Capricorn and Aquarius from now through 2023. It was a major influence in the 2018, 2019, and 2020 Eclipses, continuing its years-long power behind events.

Because Saturn plays such a large part in ruling the stage of Life for many months and even years to come, if you haven’t gotten your copy already, please give yourself the timeless gift of my book, Saturn: Spiritual Master, Spiritual Friend. We all need to make friends with our inner Saturn if we would claim our power to fulfill our higher purpose as Spirits in the material world.

Saturn helps us give form and structure to our quest for Self-realization. We are learning to use the “organized personal structure” built in Capricorn last year as we move into our greater Aquarian group work to concretize a spiritual ideal for the future, with an eye to the greatest good for the greatest number. We now approach how to structure our individual Soul energy to make our spiritual life come alive.

This book shows you the way to take command of your power to steer your life in a conscious way, using Saturn’s strengths and skills to be led to mastering life on your own terms. It was written for both astrologers and non-astrologers, and will help you understand how your life experiences assisted your Soul growth and your power to turn away from negative karmic cause and effect patterns. Each time you re-read any part of it you’re sure to find undiscovered gems of insight helping you throw off attitudes which frustrate your ability to live your higher Purpose on your own terms.

Reprinted on crystalwind.ca with written permission from Robert Wilkinson. Copying this article to other blogs is strictly prohibited. It is copyright protected. 

© Copyright 2021 Robert Wilkinson

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