Venus enters Sagittarius at 11:38 pm EDT Saturday night with two immediate and paradoxical aspects. The first, a fire trine to asteroid Magdalena on the Aries Point, indicates an emergence. The second connection, a square to Neptune on Pisces’ doorstep, suggests an immersion. Because Venus is advancing through the zodiac faster than the Sun, neither relationship will last for long. Yet both aspects, separately and in combination, initiate the Venusian tour of Sagittarius with symbolic intimations of the long ago and far away.
The last time Venus entered Sagittarius to square Neptune in the first degree of Pisces, 1685 was just getting underway. That’s a long time ago. It goes back much further, to a time uncertain, to have Magdalena in the first degree of Aries on the same day.
Magdalena is named after Mary Magdalene, whose legend is rife with uncertainty. She is reputed to have been an exceptional woman of independent means. Her extraordinary nature probably accounted for how she came to play a key role for one of Western Civilization’s seminal figures. The seminal experience of asteroid astrology has likewise been that the name of an asteroid plays a key role in its interpretation.
The interpretation of Magdalena is thus straightforward. It represents how the divine and the feminine are inseparable. A flowing fire trine from Venus at the very beginning of its time in Sagittarius anchors that interpretation to the beginning of all things, long before civilization, Western or otherwise.
The mythical Venus came first in a new order. She emerged from a vast ocean immediately after the Earth and sky severed their relations. She was the first attraction, holding everything together as the rest of the pantheon assembled. Were there to have been a condominium on Mount Olympus, her card would have borne the number one.