First quarter Moon: Olympic ritual, devotional flame

We’re in the final run-up to the 2012 Summer Olympics (the XXX Olympiad). In less than 48 hours from this posting, the last runners will carry the Olympic torch to London’s Olympic Stadium to light the cauldron during the opening ceremonies; it will remain burning for the duration of the games. The Olympics might be the most globally witnessed and embraced ritual event in modern times. Fittingly, the Sabian symbols for the positions of both the Sun and the Moon for today’s first quarter Moon (at 4:56 am EDT) speak of ritual, athletic contests and carrying a flame.

Dane Rudhyar, in his book An Astrological Mandala, interprets the symbol for 4 Leo (the Sun’s position for its square with the Moon) as, “A formally dressed elderly man stands near trophies he brought back from a hunting expedition.” He includes the keynote, “The masculine will to conquer his animal nature and to impress his peers with his skill in performing the ancient traditional power rituals.”

How’s that for a description of the Olympics – conquering one’s animal nature (and channeling it into sport rather than war) to impress peers in ancient (athletic) rituals and bring home trophies? Rudhyar even adds a note about this symbol being about dramatizing one’s achievements. The modern Olympics are nothing if not naturally dramatic as well as artificially dramatized. The vicarious thrill is enough to keep many people watching sports they might never bother to watch at any other time.

Whether that speaks more to the lack of thrills in our daily lives, the success of marketers at selling the romantic ideal of ‘The Olympics’, or some genuine, deeply compelling desire to be part of a unifying ritual and archetypal story on a grand, border-erasing scale, I’m not sure. Either way, you might ask yourself if you’re feeling compelled to engage in any traditional power rituals of your own today. Does your inner lion need any taming? Or maybe some showing off?

The Moon’s Sabian symbol at 4 Scorpio is: “A youth carries a lighted candle in a devotional ritual.” Rudhyar adds, “The educative power of ceremonies which impress the great images of a culture upon its gathered participants.”

I think I actually laughed out loud about the literal manifestation of this one when I thought of the relay of Olympic torch bearers, young and old. That and the impression of “great images of a culture” on those gathered to participate. It’s the opening ceremonies to a T.

Rudhyar goes on to describe how communities are “ensouled” by a few basic symbols that are incorporated into traditional activities and ceremonies that shape young people – until such time as they forswear them, individuate, and look for new ones. Does this square between Sun and Moon feel like an urge to recognize new values apart from those impressed upon you in your youth? Since the Moon is in Scorpio, what about the sexual rituals and symbols that unite us at a deep, root level?

Sexual rituals, the devotional flame, conquering animal nature for the sake of ritual: do these themes bring anything to mind? Say, perhaps, Vesta and the Vestal Virgins? (Vows of celibacy being a kind of sexual ritual.)

In looking up the Olympic torch in Wikipedia, I discovered the following:

Commemorating the theft of fire from the Greek god Zeus by Prometheus, its origins lie in ancient Greece, where a fire was kept burning throughout the celebration of the ancient Olympics. The fire was reintroduced at the 1928 Summer Olympics in Amsterdam, and it has been part of the modern Olympic Games ever since. [Note: the relay was not introduced until the controversial 1936 games in Berlin, and has no ancient precedent.]

The Olympic Torch today is ignited several months before the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games at the site of the ancient Olympic in Olympia, Greece. Eleven women, representing the Vestal Virgins, perform a ceremony in which the torch is kindled by the light of the Sun, its rays concentrated by a parabolic mirror.

If we overlook the fact that Vesta was the Roman goddess of the hearth, not Greek, this is kind of a cool touch. Astrologically speaking, the minor planet Vesta is in the mix – as is Prometheus/Uranus (who stole fire for humanity) and Zeus/Jupiter.

The Sun is loosely sextile Vesta, which is at 7 Gemini. Retrograde Mercury makes an exact sextile to Vesta very close to the beginning of the Olympic opening ceremonies. In Eric’s discussion of the opening ceremonies chart in tomorrow’s issue, he notes some aspects that are slippery and cryptic. Perhaps Vesta’s presence in the conversation with Mercury and the Sun will make a devotional offering to offset things.

In any case, she’s also talking to Uranus (Prometheus, the fire-bearer) in Aries, Chiron the healer in Pisces, Pluto the force of change in Capricorn, and she’s practically whispering in the ear of Jupiter (Zeus), the expansive god of the gods, in Gemini. In other words, devotion to your creativity and sexual flame is multi-faceted and overlays this quarter Moon and whatever projects are ripe for a push forward or new direction. What in your life is ready to be lit by a flame that lasts, with fire straight from the Sun?