The Personal is Political

 

October 14, 2005

 

http://cainer.com/ericfrancis/oct14.html

 

Dear Eric,

 

I am looking for the most succinct summary of the Aries Point that I can find in your writing, but I can't quite find what I'm looking for. Can you help?

 

A. Writer

 

 

Dear A:

 

Arwynne, who helps with this project from Vancouver, BC, has weeded through my various ideas about the Aries Point on your behalf and come up with a few selections. Maybe you'll find what you're looking for among them.

 

But first I will go over the basics.

 

You know that there are two zodiacs, right? One based on the seasons, called the tropical zodiac (because the tropics are used to measure it), and the other based on the stars, called the sidereal zodiac (because the stars are used to measure it). You could say that one is a wheel inside the other wheel.

 

The Aries Point is the point along the sidereal zodiac where the tropical zodiac begins; that is, where we start counting at 00 Aries. It happens to be where the Sun is on the first day of spring in the Northern Hemisphere.

 

The Aries Point is also called the Sidereal Vernal Point or SVP. The word "sidereal" means pertaining to the stars in space (rather than the planets). The SVP is the location of the Sun in space on the day that the Sun is square the equator, also called the Vernal Equinox -- i.e., the first day of Northern Hemisphere spring. This is the first degree of the Western or tropical zodiac (the one you read about in newspapers and most astrology books). The tropical zodiac begins in the sidereal zodiac at 5 degrees of Pisces and 22 minutes. Thus the SVP is located in this sidereal degree.

 

But we call it "zero Aries." If you understood that, proceed directly to MIT. Now -- for a variety of reasons -- the first degree of Aries is connected to very similar effects at the first degrees of Cancer, Libra and Capricorn -- the cardinal cross.

 

For whatever reason, this set of points is very sensitive to transits, eclipses and other events, and it has been particularly so in the past half decade, since a total solar eclipse on June 21, 2001 which I covered recently in this space. It occurs to me while I am writing that I have not covered one interesting idea about why this might be happening now. In the last edition, I introduced the Uranian Points, these eight weird planets without bodies. One of the points, called Kronos -- a kind of super-Saturn -- is located very close to the first degree of Cancer. It moves excruciatingly slowly; the Uranians have orbits that go from about two to seven centuries in length.

 

Next, there is a massive galaxy and black hole in the very early degrees of Libra, at just over one degree. This is called M87.

 

Last, there is a galactic point right where Sagittarius becomes Capricorn, called the Road to Xibalba, that is associated with the 2012 effect. So we have all four of the Cardinal Points covered with some major thing associated with either a galactic point or a point beyond our solar system. Thus, when there is much activity on or near these points -- as there has been lately, and will be for a while -- we get an acceleration of experience, and news events that bring in a lot of people; and news events which everyone can feel and relate to.

 

We could call the Aries Point the One World Point, because it reminds us that we live in one world.

 

It is all rather cosmic, and also points us beyond life on Earth to something much larger: longer time scales than we're used to thinking in, the heart of our home galaxy, a great neighboring galaxy, and the point where the zodiac begins.

 

The SVP has become a definite theme of the Astrology Secrets Revealed series, which I think is because the theme of this series has become where individual lives intersect with the larger collective world in which we live. For reference, the Aries Point is used most often by practitioners of Uranian astrology; this method is written about extensively in the current edition of The Mountain Astrologer, and also covered on the homepage of Martha Lang Wescott, TreehouseMountain.com.

 

Here are some quotes from my old articles.

 

"We had an eclipse in Libra just one week ago, on the Aries Point -- the latest in a long series of Aries Point events that make the news personal..." (Astrology Secrets Revealed, Oct. 8, 2005)

 

"It's interesting that astrology sees the connection between our private or individual existence and its connection to the larger public life a lot more clearly than we do. One of the great issues of our times is that we tend to see ourselves as separate from the world in which we live... We're steadily moving into one of those extended moments when we'll be able to see and feel the connections, and where the level of energy increases quickly...The Aries Point is related to the first degree of the other three 'cardinal signs' -- those signs which, with the entry of the Sun, begin the seasons: Cancer, Libra and Capricorn." (Astrology Secrets Revealed, June 10, 2005 - "The Aries Point Cometh")

 

"What we also know is that our zodiac, called the 'tropical zodiac', is based on the changing of the seasons. The 'cardinal points' are where the Sun reaches a seasonal turning point, makes a 90-degree angle to one of the tropics or the equator, and enters a cardinal sign -- Aries, Cancer, Libra or Capricorn. The master point is presumed to be the Aries point, where the Sun crosses at the beginning of the astrological year, and where the Western zodiac (the tropical zodiac) is reckoned with the Eastern constellations (the sidereal zodiac).

 

"Basically, the cardinal points are a highly sensitive energy structure, shaped like a cross. It is now clear that this cross, whose action and influence was long a mystery, may be so sensitive due to its proximity to the Galactic Core and M87. The cardinal points are sensitive whether the Sun is there or not. They are so predictable that, when activated by planets or planetary events (such as a Full Moon or eclipse), they will often respond with a worldly event or chain of events that affects many people." (Astrology Secrets Revealed - Sep. 9, 2005)

 

"Events involving the Aries Point, or people with it prominent in their charts, have impact. Their lives can affect many people. They have a connection to the public and the public has a connection to them. This is the degree of the zodiac bearing the message, 'The personal is political'. By extension, the first degree of any of the cardinal signs -- Aries, Cancer, Libra and Capricorn, the degrees the Sun crosses on the first day of any new season -- have a similar feeling and effect. In recent years, the Aries Point axis has been popping up as particularly influential.

 

"It was directly involved in the Sept. 11 situation, which we now know is complex and deeply scandalous. This continued as the story developed over the years, including its demented morph into the Iraq war. And in a fairly strange twist, the Aries Point was directly involved in the Asian tsunami, which came at a Full Moon in the early degrees of Cancer and Capricorn." (Planet Waves, "At the Edge of the Stage")

 

"Deep Throat is a living testimony to the Aries Point... Among other things, we will see something come to full fruition that has its genesis at the Cancer solstice total solar eclipse of June 2001. We shall see what." (Astrology Secrets Revealed, June 3, 2005)

 

"The Aries Point [has] some unusual properties: public contact, a collective quality, the personalization of large events, and lasting effects through time among them. The example of an Aries point effect I've been using is the June 21, 2001 summer solstice total solar eclipse, which occurred in the first degree of Cancer, exactly square the Aries Point. The summer of 2001 is of course a time nobody who lived through it will forget, truly heralding the dawn of an era.

 

"We could speculate about why this particular point has so much influence. It is, for one thing, the degree of reckoning between the tropical horoscope (the one we're all familiar with) and what's called the sidereal horoscope, or the backdrop of actual stars (used in Vedic astrology; sidereal is another word for stellar). The 'sidereal vernal point' is another name for the Aries point, meaning the place where the tropical horoscope begins. Because of precessional movement, that is, the slow wobbling of the Earth making the heavens appear to rotate, this point moves. It slides backwards through the stellar backdrop, and the calendar, so that each century spring begins about one day earlier. This is why the sign we call Pisces, for example, is mostly located in the constellation Aquarius." (Planet Waves, "Equinox: With Love from M87")

 

Okay, there you have it. I am sure there is more in Google, as are all these references.