PISCIAN SWIM

 The sun is now in that gentle and undefined sign of Pisces. However, that apparent gentle sensitivity hides the potential of quite a strong personality once it has been awakened to what it wants from life.

PISCES

Traditionally the glyph for Pisces of two fishes swimming in opposite directions symbolised the conflict between spirit and soul. This could also be interpreted as conflict between soul and personality; or what is the true self as against the superficial habit patterns that have been adopted or encouraged by the environment and teaching. You know, that little inner voice of consciousness that we so often ignore in order to let the senses have their own way – that extra chocolate, that extra glass of wine to aid in the must of socialising or just to assist in getting through the day. Most Pisceans need a stronger personality to guide them or hang on to for support and guidance in the rough and tumble of practical mundane living. However, the stronger Piscean, in their turn can also be carriers of advice, help and guidance, once they have found the energy to train themselves.

 

“Be warned and understand truly that two fishes are swimming in our sea”, says Lambspring.

Fairy Spirits by John Anster Fitzgerald

Pisceans like to dream; they are people very happy with the abstract. Some like to bring those dreams into existence; some can do this, some just can’t seem to get it together or focus on that practical execution of their thoughts, dreams and visions.

 

Like the former sign of Aquarius, Pisces too has two planets associated with it. They are Jupiter and Neptune. This would indicate that Pisces shares a complexity with Scorpio and Aquarius, albeit of a different type. A Piscean can be found serving drinks at the bar [or on the other side of the bar drinking them]; or expounding on a mathematical formula in the lecture theatre; or painting a marvellous sunset; or dancing and singing to their hearts content; or selflessly serving the poor of mind or body. Piscean capabilities are endless and as varied as the life in the sea with which they have such great affinity. There is another ‘sea’ though, that one in the sky that we call space; the sea above, which probably has as many invisible inhabitants as the sea ‘below’, if we but had the senses to observe them.

‘The Three Graces’ 

So easily can the Piscean understand the ‘Three Graces’ if they wish to, symbols of the triple action of grace which is ‘giving, receiving and returning’.  ‘Pagan Mysteries’ of the Renaissance’ by E.A. Wind, is all about art, music and mythology, and bound to appeal to the reading and searching Piscean.

AAL’S LABYRINTH HISTORY An Alternative Viewpoint…..contd. #57

SEVENTH CENTURY BCE (699-600)

 

7^th C BCE        Etruria (land of Etruscans) was at its zenith during the 7-6 century BCE and was comprised of 12 city-states including Veii, Bolsena, Tarquinia, Volterra and Perugia. The Etruscan culture had the same gods as the Greeks who had colonised southern Italy. The Etruscan culture formed the basis of one branch of the Latin civilization. (182)

Etruscan Sarcophagi

689 BCE          The Assyrians invade and destroy the Babylonian culture.

The Babylonia text MUl Apin is the first known Mesopotamian star catalogue, a copy of which is to be held in the Library of Nineveh. The original probably dates from 1000 BCE.  The title is taken from the first line of the text and refers to the ‘star Apin’ which is the constellation Triangulum, together with gamma Andromedae. The text records astronomical events including the heliacal rising, culmination and setting of certain fixed stars. The Assyrians extended this work into the text known as ‘Enuma Anu Enlil’. (46)

                    Velikovsky said that this is the time that the length of the year changed from 360 days to 365 ¼ days. (344)Previously, according to the ancient Egyptians, there were 360 days in the human year and five days dedicated to the gods.

Triangulum & Andromeda. 

[Sky Walk 15.2.24]

675             ESARHADDON (r. 681-68) son of Assyrian King Sargon II, captures the Egyptian capital Memphis, rebuilds Babylon and expands the Assyrian Empire. Egypt becomes a Persian province.

                   The original Sargon, ‘Sargon the Great’ [c2340 BCE] was the founder of the great nation of Mesopotamia.

 

650 BCE      ASHURBANIPAL II (Ashurbanapal/Asurbanipal) (668 - d.c.627BC) son of Sargon II and last great king of the Assyrian Empire. He runs a lavish court at Nineveh, which will be captured in 612 BCE by the Medes and Babylonians.  

 

                       ASSYRIA is a large empire based on the city of Ashur or Assur, which is located on the River Tigris of Mesopotamia. The Assyrian Empire came into being in 3^rd millennium BCE, to reach its peak in 9-7^th centuries BCE. It will eventually be absorbed into what is to become known as the Persian Empire.  

 

                     Assurbanipal collected contemporary historical records, hymns, poems, scientific and religious texts from the archives of the ancient seats of learning, that is from Babylon, Uruk and Nippur.  Copies and translations where also made of the even older Sumerian language of Mesopotamia. All these works were rendered into the contemporary Akkadian Semitic language for Assurbanipal’s library. (188)

 

              The library of Ashurbanipal at Nineveh contained most of the Assyrian and Babylonian religious and magical texts collected from ancient temple cities. The Assyrian scribes copied from very ancient texts and the Sumerian language was still largely employed. In the library was a great collection of astrological omens called the ‘Enuma Anu Enlil’. (1)

      

      Examples from Ashurbanipal’s Library

                 Assurbanipal’s library contained the last known recension of the ‘Epic of Gilgamesh’, a cycle of poems about Gilgamesh, [see 2,700 BCE] king and hero of the ancient city state of Uruk in Mesopotamia.  This mythic cycle probably originates in the time between Abraham and Noah (3^rd millennium BCE). The themes are of the human concern with mortality, the search for knowledge and escape from the common lot. The most important elements of this relatively complete work existed as separate poems in the older Sumerian literature. Tradition takes the story back into a preliterate age on the borderline of legend and history, a little later than the Deluge when gods were replaced by mortals on the thrones of the city-states in the age of Archaic Sumerian civilizations. (188. 13.)

 

Valentine Waves

 

[photo credit: Dudley Simpson@baerenwald.exporer. December 2023]

The 14^th February is Valentine’s Day, a special day for bringing love to planet Earth. This year it is a particularly powerful astrological/astronomical time centring around this date. This is because of the activity of many minor planets are heralding Pluto’s move into the sign of the future, Aquarius. Between the 13^th and 17^thFebruary be aware that here is a chance to change things around radically, in the world and in our personal lives. Will we lose our temper and blow things apart? Or will we act in mature ways, over-come our little personal woes and wants, and thus transmute all that built up energy into something new and useful. Can we turn that energy into waves of healing rather than waves of destruction? 

Are these sound or light waves?

How many of us can think positively and with love, remembering that as we think we also speak, so thus we create the world that we live in – an old cliché but one well worth thinking about. Once set in motion, these energy waves ripple out into the environment, like the ripples on a pond creating a soothing ambiance or a disturbing tide of movement.

Sound Waves

The planetary formations of this time could well herald the Aquarian beginnings at a more tangible level and what we do now could end up governing the next twenty or so years of our personal, cultural, social, political, scientific and spiritual life.

 

Can we make this an Aquarian time of our best efforts, as following on from the transit of Sun and Mercury, the planets Mars and Venus bunch up with Pluto at the very cusp of Aquarius, and all-around Valentines’ day?

 

The glossy side of the next 20 or so years of Pluto in Aquarius is likely to see an increase in intellectual, humanitarian, ingenious, unconventional behaviour and love of freedom. The search for truth goes on at an increased pace indicating more important scientific and spiritual discoveries and development. An emphasis may also be given to how we communicate our dreams and ideas, all under the guidance of the radical planet Uranus.  But we must remember that the planet Saturn also has rulership of Aquarius and is important for giving a practical outcome to Uranian innovation, and not be like Pisces, just lost in dreams and imagination. Will Aquarius bring that longed for brotherhood of humans? Or will it just encase us in more surveillance, control and forced groupings? Or indeed a new type of slavery driven by out of control AI as we all work for a central ‘cause’. The interesting thing is that, undeveloped countries are somewhat immune from all this, for they do not have the technology or the problems of western development – so do indeed ‘the meek inherit the earth’?

Cosmic Waves

Once the planet Pluto has entered into the sign of Aquarius, it will dance with the planet Neptune for many years to come, and in the process offer us the opportunity of creative dreaming or the opposite scenario of weird and wonderful psychic mental states and bizarre behaviour. It will offer the opportunity for populations en-masse to develop clear sighted intuition that can be harnessed to sort out the knotty life problems that we have got ourselves into. Or we can descend into debauched, malicious behaviour centred around control and dominance, a little spoken of side to Aquarius unusual, eccentric and rebellious behaviour. If we know the truth of potential, that groups and communities have more power than radical individuals, then we can be more awake to our latent mistakes and go some way to avoiding them. This is a time for team effort, balanced belief systems and not the individual ego; a time for moving on to new ways of doing things but with wisdom, not under the impetus of inflexible ambition.

 

AI, artificial or alien intelligence, is gathering speed and feeding on itself just like the Ouroborus. The Ouroborus is that ancient symbol of a serpent eating its own tail and thus depicting the endless cycle of generation and regeneration until finally wisdom is obtained. Nothing is new, all goes around in cycles, perhaps with a different surface expression.

Ouroboros 1478

Can we use love to bring more harmony to the world and our personal lives? Happy Valentine who can.

Botticelli ‘Birth of Venus’ 1485

or the love of a new beginning.  

On the 14^th February our Sun aligns with the star Sador. 

This star marks the heart of the Swan, the constellation Cygnus.

Radical Uranus

 The planet Uranus has a special affinity with the sign of Aquarius. Saturn was the traditional ruler of this sign and still maintains its influence, for not all can respond positively to the rarefied atmosphere of Uranus, well not until they have passed the tests of Saturn. The Uranian influence was consciously added to our living experience of the planet Saturn, when it was rediscovered in 1781.

Kronos, reaper, time keeper and boundary marker

Saturn experience, and labour, lays down the much needed preparations and foundations for life and action so that the Uranian genius and inspiration has a solid platform to work from – the engineer needs good training in theoretical mathematics before reaching the point of being able to make the inventions and designs functional; the artist and writer needs to practise their techniques to give form to their dreams and imagination; the astrologer/astronomer needs years of observing and perfecting calculations before being able to apply the information intuitively to his/her understanding of people, events and the world; a successful revolution driven by Uranian forces needs the careful planning and organization of Saturn if it is to meet its intended purpose, that is to overthrow what used to be. Can you see the potentially useful balance of Saturn and Uranus energies combined? Without Saturn discipline and hard work, Uranus cannot manifest the change, the genius, in any positive and sustained way that is of use to use in our material world.

 

Uranus, deity of the starry sky, can fly because although he doesn’t like or observe boundaries, he has to utilise them, for unfortunately that is the way our material world works. The Female polarity of Uranus is the Egyptian sky goddess Nut.

The Egyptian Nut goddess of the starry night overarching creation. 

Related to the Greek/Roman god Uranus the smasher of boundaries.

Saturn lays the boundaries and the rules and then a Uranian influence comes along and wakens us up to greater possibilities, either accepted or not. Imaginative ideas need a structure within which to work. Have you ever tried flying without wings; have you ever had wonderful ideas that you couldn’t catch; have you only thought about the idea of doing good for the group? If you have then perhaps you need a little more Saturn structure and application in your life to define and execute these wonderful ideas. Combine the principles of these two planetary influences and you have unique rhythms and potential of extraordinary output.

The Tarot Magician

As Dione Fortune says, ‘If we try to escape from the discipline of matter before we have mastered the lessons of matter, we are not advancing heavenwards but suffering from arrested development.’