...March '23 through November '24...
Here's an overview of Pluto's upcoming transit path, an
excellent article by Scottish Western/tropical astrologer
Anne Whitaker, for those interested in this angle... ;)
***
For the UK, an era ended on the 8th of September 2022
with the death of Queen Elizabeth the Second, an event
which reverberated around the world. Regardless of one’s
politics, the death of a monarch has archetypal power:
many people with no particular regard for the UK royal
family – including this writer – were surprised at the
impact this event had.
However, the Queen’s passing at this especially turbulent
time not just in the UK’s history but in the world at
large has focused my reflections on the particular
significance of the fractious and divisive Saturn/Uranus
lens through which we humans seem to have been
substantially viewing then acting out our collective
social and individual lives from the spring of 2020 when
Saturn first entered Aquarius, and are likely to continue
to do so until Saturn enters Pisces in the spring of
2023. With Saturn gradually coming into orb of a wide
sextile to the Jupiter/Uranus conjunction in Taurus in
early 2024, let’s hope things then cool down somewhat…
There is, of course, a much bigger symbolic backdrop to
this particular Saturn/Uranus square. Being especially
interested in observing how the larger planetary cycles
correlate with changing patterns of human collective
behaviour, I have already written in some depth about the
significance of the big shift from an Earth era defined
by the 20-year Jupiter/Saturn cycles traversing the Earth
element from 1803, to an Air era beginning with the
Jupiter/Saturn conjunction at 0 Aquarius on the Winter
Solstice of 2020, then running for around two hundred
years. (i)
Pluto will emphasise this momentous era shift by first
entering Aquarius in the spring of 2023, following on his
long sojourn in Capricorn from the spring of 2008 which
kicked off with a devastating world banking crisis. Also
– in 2025 Neptune enters Aries, for the first time since
the onset of the American civil war in the 1850s,
ushering in a Fire/Air period for the next number of
years.
So – our lives are not likely to settle down any time
soon…
Ranging from the climate wars (Extinction Rebellion,
anyone?) to increasingly rage-filled trans and woke
movements on both sides of the Atlantic, to land-grab war
in Europe with attendant disruption to food and energy
supplies worldwide, to a bitterly contested and hugely
divisive election result in the USA, to revelations of an
increasingly persecuted Uighur minority in China, my
impression – having lived through quite a few
Saturn/Uranus aspects by now! – is that divisions and
polarisations arising from the period of the current
square, have been more black-and-white, intolerant and
brutal than in previous Saturn /Uranus periods.
Why should this be? Having thought about the matter in
the context of other large-scale disruptive changes also
taking place has brought me to what I think is an
explanation, symbolically speaking.
Putting things simply: Saturn rules Capricorn, the last
sign of the 1803-2020 Earth era to be traversed first by
the Jupiter/Saturn conjunction, then by Pluto, lord of
the Underworld. Symbolically speaking, with the
Jupiter/Saturn conjunction then Pluto moving into
Aquarius, the rule of planetary old god Saturn is being
replaced by that of planetary new god Uranus. However,
to add another layer of complexity and conflict,
Aquarius’ old ruler is Saturn, new ruler is Uranus – and
Pluto’s shift from Capricorn to Aquarius will not be
completed until 19th November 2024: a mere two weeks
after the next USA Election takes place on 5th November
2024. What stunning timing…
Astrologers man their symbolic barricades over this one:
the Trads insisting on Saturn as co-ruler of Capricorn
and Aquarius, the Mods favouring Uranus alone. Take your
pick…whichever you favour, there is an especially bitter
symbolic battle of the giants taking place worldwide as
we shift from one long Era to another, a battle at every
level: environmental, political, national, cultural,
personal.
So – what comes next?
Much speculation regarding the shape of things to come
has been going on for some time now, set to intensify as
we await Pluto’s traverse through Aquarius from the
spring of 2023 to early 2044, giving a heavy symbolic
weighting to that sign for a long time to come.
Aquarius is the sign of the human collective, symbolising
an energy driven to pursuing and promoting ideals
regarding how we should be moving forward in order to
create a fairer, more equal world. It is a highly
rational, technology and future-oriented, “Let’s get
together to make the world a better place”, kind of
energy.
As such, we should see some major developments at all
levels as power (Pluto) shifts towards The People, away
from plutocrats, oligarchs, and from politics rooted in
gaining material power and control through exploitation
of planet Earth’s diminishing resources, towards (in
theory!!) more equal world-wide sharing of power derived
from an Air-based technologically expedited economic
system. Also, the development of wind and solar energy is
likely to accelerate with Neptune’s shift into Aries from
2025 onwards.
Pluto’s last sojourn through Aquarius (1778–1798) brought
with it sweeping changes in social order and public
rights, including: the ratification of the American
constitution following the USA’s breaking away from
Britain’s colonial control, the rise and expansion of the
Industrial Revolution, the Enlightenment, the French
Revolution, and the publishing of ‘The Vindication of the
Rights of Women’ by Mary Wollestonecraft.
None of this was accomplished without The People or
individuals in one way or another rising up against
prevailing regimes, rules, or ideas perceived as being
outdated and oppressive. So we can expect cultural,
social, political and environmental upheaval to gain
momentum as Pluto shifts into Aquarius and the
Capricornian penchant for collective coercive control
socially, politically and environmentally is severely
challenged. We are very much seeing this right now, with
recent uprisings in Iran triggered by the death of a
young woman in the custody of the so-called Morality
Police still ongoing, and widespread public protests
triggered by three years of stringent covid restrictions
right across China. These protests are largely being
spearheaded by the young…
What we really need in tomorrow’s Aquarian world, though,
is a radical change of attitude. Essentially, as one
astrologer I was reading recently so succinctly put it,
it is ‘…time for us to figure out what it means to be
human and how to live together on this planet without
fighting over everything…’ (ii)
A tall order indeed…
In our own small country the UK, still insisting on
seeing itself as a major world player, we can certainly
expect People Power to exert itself more forcefully as we
move towards next spring. Our new Tory Chancellor is
reportedly considering removing the cap on bankers’
bonuses imposed by the European Union following the
greed-fuelled virtual collapse of the world banking
system in 2008. (BBC news 15.9.22) This will not go down
well – to say the least! – with those sectors of our
population who have to choose between heating and eating
this coming winter.
UPDATE: the new Chancellor and his Prime Minister lasted
less than six weeks in power, having created mayhem on
the world financial markets and worsening the already
serious cost of living crisis in the UK with their
disastrous budget. The incoming Prime Minister Sunak and
his Chancellor Hunt have acted swiftly to abandon those
policies and restore a measure of stability – for now…
Also, our late Queen, mourned and well respected by much
of the UK’s population, especially in Scotland where she
died, having been laid to rest with due pomp and
ceremony, huge questions will surely come to the fore
regarding the future of the monarchy in our increasingly
strained United Kingdom.
What, then, of the wider picture, especially regarding
Russian President Putin’s increasingly disastrous-looking
attempt to land-grab and control Ukraine, currently
looking like the feistiest, bravest nation on the planet?
Here are the forthright words of that redoubtable
Australian astrologer, Jessica Adams, from a post on her
website on 13/3/2022, shortly after Russia invaded
Ukraine:
‘…And yet, you don’t need Putin’s birth chart, actually,
to see which way the wind is blowing. Pluto (power) in
Capricorn (the man at the top) is finished on March 24th,
2023. This is the end of an era when plutocrats (which
Pluto represents in astrology) who are the top goats on
the mountain (Capricorn) fall off – as the mountain
itself collapses…’ (iii)
‘The old order changeth…’ (iv)
Fasten your seat belts, people. It’s going to be some
ride.
Endnotes:
This is an edited version of my essay“The old order
changeth, yielding place to new…” published in the UK’s
Astrological Journal November/December 2022, soon to be
re-published in The Federation of Australian Astrologers
Journal under the same title, with permission…
(i) See the P.S Windows to the Future section of my
recent collection “Postcards to the Future”(August 2021),
including ‘Waning and waxing crescents: windows to the
future’ (first published in The Mountain Astrologer Dec
2020/Jan 2021)pp 365-380
(ii)https://jessicadavidson.co.uk/2021/06/07/pluto-in-
aquarius-the-evolution-of-society-and-technology/
(iii) from Jessica Adams’ Twitter post of 12 September
2022
(iv). “The old order changeth, yielding place to new…”
from Alfred, Lord Tennyson’s great epic poem Morte
d’Arthur, published 1842.
©Anne Whitaker 2022
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