Today's Change in the Mars Chain of Command

Sun is in upper left quadrant at 29 degrees Virgo 47 minutes.  Chart for 11:32am Sept 22, 2013

“The buck stops here” does not apply when there are few or no planets in their signs of rulership. 

Today at 5:30pm in our town of sidewalks rolling with acorns, the Sun will leave the sign Virgo and enter the sign Libra.  The Sun’s position is always important, but while Mars is in Leo we focus even more on our local star’s location.

Rulerships are a good way to gain a deeper understanding of planets and signs.  It can seem silly to think of the Sun as being under the influence of little Mercury just because it is in the sign Virgo.  One way to think of it, without having to learn a bunch about the geometry of the ecliptic, is to think of the signs as activities the planets pass through.  Whenever any planet passes through a sign associated with basic communication, it is under the influence of the planet that communicates.  The planets are the ‘doers’ and the signs are the various activities the ‘doers’ cycle through.

What the Sun does is shine- so when it is in Leo, the sign of radiance, it is doing what it does best.  It is ruling.  When it enters the sign Virgo it is passing through the activity of fruit ripening.  It is no longer in its favorite territory of eye catching flowers but reduced the task of making sure fruit is getting just enough light to help it reach maturity. 

Mercury does not shine like the Sun but passes back and forth in front of and behind it.  Without ever going far from the Sun it rapidly cycles back and forth like a short antenna sweeping the bounds of local territory.  Mercury is a communicator, constantly making small adjustments.  It rules the sign Gemini associated with sprouting of leaves, and Virgo where the fruit ripens.  

While Mars is in Leo, the sign of steady outgoing energy, it is ruled by the Sun—but while the Sun is in Virgo it is weakening, rapidly.  Yes it shines just as brightly as the rest of the year, but we in the northern hemisphere are getting a lot less of its radiation with every passing day.  We are aware of a need to adjust to the loss of energy.  All organisms in the northern hemisphere that have evolved over the last 4 billion or so trips around the Sun know the schedule and are well prepared for the change, whether they use words to talk about it or not.

So today the Sun passes from Virgo to Libra, it crosses below the celestial equator.  (UNL Daylight Hours Explorer) But Mars is still back there in Leo rising fairly high in the sky every day, still in that place associated with flowers and courtship.  So what is Mars good at?  Mars rules Aries actively and Scorpio passively.  In Aries the seed explodes and the truth comes out, and in Scorpio all not consumed begins to decompose except the seed.  Mars is the truth, either revealed (in Aries) or hidden (in Scorpio), that life is a mess of competing interests.  Mars is the competitor, hero or soldier.  While in Leo the soldier has to play a game, or engage in theatrical activities rather than actually explode and smite the competition or sneak behind enemy lines and steal some ammunition.

While the CEO of the theater company (the Sun) has been down the block in Virgo, Mars is engaged in intellectual theatrical productions.  There has to be some socially redeeming moral to the story the hero is acting out.  Virgo productions are less geared toward entertaining the crowd and more toward encouraging them to follow the rules.

So while the CEO of the production Mars must dance through has been in Virgo (Sun in Virgo), why don’t we look and see what Virgo’s ruler is doing?  Mercury is in Libra, the sign of the harvest, actively ruled by Venus. 

We’ve got a long chain of command going here—Mars ruled by the Sun, the Sun ruled by Mercury, and now Mercury ruled by Venus!  So our hero’s theatrical production is not only overseen by a goody two shoes student but that student is under the rule of Venus calling always for balance and generosity.  But wait a minute…. balance and generosity are not exactly front page news right now.  If Mar’s current chain of command leads to Venus, then we also need to know what Venus is doing.

“The buck stops here” does not apply when there are few or no planets in their signs of rulership.  Venus right now is in Scorpio, under the passive rulership of Mars!  The planet that should ultimately oversee Mar’s Leonine march down victory lane is in its detriment. 

Detriment is an astrological term for a planet in the sign opposite its place of rulership.  Venus rules Libra, the sign of generosity; and Taurus, the sign of accepting things as they are. It is the planet of growing where one is planted.  But right now it is in Scorpio the sign of retreating into the darkness and hiding the seeds of the next generation until conditions are right for them to sprout.  Venus, a planet of peace and generosity, is in a sign of secrets and withdrawal of life.

Not only that but if you look at the charts, you can see that Venus has just finished up a meeting (Sept 18) with Saturn, the planet of discipline.

So we have a chain of command that circles back on its self.  Mars in Leo is ruled by the Sun.  The Sun in Virgo is ruled by Mercury.  Mercury in Libra is ruled by Venus.  And Venus in Scorpio is ruled by Mars. 

When the Sun enters Libra this evening the command will bypass Mercury and go directly to Venus, removing a good deal of intellectual activity from the Leonine production that Mars is engaged in, and focusing more on Venus struggling to radiate kindness from under a pile of fallen leaves and a few worm eaten apples.

Sun is in upper right quadrant at 0 degrees Libra 02 minutes.  Chart is for 5:32pm Sept 22, 2013.