Ain’t Necessarily So – Venus enters Scorpio

I takes de gospel, whenever it’s pos’ble, but wid a grain of salt.
-George and Ira Gershwin

Venus plunges into watery Scorpio over the weekend. Astrology’s gospel considers that to be a letdown after a tenure of rulership in Libra. That’s because Scorpio opposes Taurus, the other sign Venus rules. Conventional wisdom says that when a planet is opposed to its domicile, it is in detriment. A planet in detriment is not its best likeness, similar to the photo on many a driver’s license. The traditional approach has sound rationale. For every up there must be a down. It’s just as important, however, to look at the whole picture. The holistic lesson for Venus in Scorpio this year is that it ain’t necessarily so. That will probably translate in your own experience as keeping the proverbial grain of salt handy when the gospel of an oppressive and besieged established order does not ring entirely true.

Paraphrasing astrologer Sheila Belanger, planets function as archetypes for events or circumstances in our lives. Furthermore, the movement of an object from one sign to another represents a change in attire. In Libra, the Venus epitome of attraction wore the fair costume of equity. According to convention, the Scorpio raiment will have a darker hue of vanity and intrigue. While clothing does give us valuable clues, it is a stereotypical and incomplete source of information. For the whole story of a countenance, we need to know the circumstances of its origin as well as its context as part of a greater whole.

It is said that any given course of events is substantially determined by how things begin. The story of Venus in Scorpio will start with a little object that has a powerful name. About 20 minutes before Venus moves into the fixed water sign, asteroid Eros enters cardinal Cancer. Within the same hour the two form a trine, which means they will be talking to each other. Shortly thereafter, Chiron will conference in from Pisces, making it a grand trine connecting all the water signs. A fluid and momentous conversation it is likely to be.

Most asteroids orbit the Sun in a main belt between Mars and Jupiter. While astrology does not have the same long experience with them as it does with the classical planets, a pattern is beginning to emerge — what you read is what you get. Time and time again, the practical archetype of an asteroid will match its name with uncanny accuracy. Eros is a big, albeit marginalized, name in western culture.

The seminal ancient Greeks considered Eros to be a primordial deity, simply there from the beginning. Sigmund Freud brought that name forward to describe what he saw as the primary human motivation. It is interesting that the later, more civilized ancient Greeks demoted Eros from old school to second generation, the offspring of Venus and Mars. The ancient Romans went even further, co-opting it as Cupid, which has come down to us as a harmless cherub with a toy bow and arrow. Similarly, our modern culture has compromised Freud’s fundamental drive to life and elevated death. Eros must be a powerful thing to be so long and consistently repressed by human power structures. A heartfelt conversation on the issue would appear to be just what the doctor ordered. In this case, the physician is Chiron.

The late astrologer Al Morrison, perhaps sensing a kindred spirit, described Chiron as an “inconvenient benefic,” which is something like your doctor telling you this is going to hurt a little bit. Robert Hand has characterized the first centaur’s archetype as the relationship between the health of an entire system and that of its most vulnerable part. As the defining component of a grand water trine that distinguishes the first full day of Venus in Scorpio, Chiron’s part of the conversation will be to keep a focus on what is vital, even if it does not measure up to some sort of preconceived or imposed ideal.

Venus in Libra was the representation of an ideal, the equivalence of truth and beauty. That was well and good. Ideals are something to aspire to, but the real is what we have to deal with daily. Based on how it begins, this weekend’s entry of Venus into Scorpio will not be detrimental at all. The likely feel is keeping it real, and not in a mean or spiteful fashion either. It will be a matter of allowing Venus to step off its pedestal and vamp it up a bit without judgement. 

In conversation with Eros and Chiron, Venus in Scorpio holds a healing, if inconvenient potential. There will be an opportunity to open our hearts to a conversation that is both passionate and compassionate. It will encourage us to re-engage our connection between the archetype of attraction and the drive to affirm life. Ultimately, we will see a chance to save our butts a from timeless tyranny that terrifies us with death as the consequence of what in fact is not a sin, but desire for healing in the body. It will be a chance to reclaim and expand our marginalized freedom by telling the tyrants, both within and without, that the basis of their hegemony ain’t necessarily so.

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