by Robert Wilkinson
Following up on the general meaning and function of the "Inferior Conjunction" between the Sun and Mercury, today we explore specifics of the current Inferior Conjunction of Nov 1, 2013, at 10 Scorpio.
Because this particular Inferior Conjunction is an extremely important event due to when and where it's happening, this is a long article that will pull together a comprehensive overview that ties together past, present, and future.
The inferior conjunction is when Mercury (mind) conjuncts the Sun (life) while retrograde. This indicates that signals, messages, and ideas from either outer sources or subconscious sources will fuse with the life principle, setting the tone for the lessons involving how our minds are relating to our lives during the next four months. Since Mercury is retrograde, the degree of the inferior conjunction shows how our lives will merge with our perceptions and bring forth a new understanding of our light.
The Sabian Symbol for the Inferior Conjunction
The degree for the 10th degree of Scorpio is said to be "A fellowship supper.” In the original Jones class notes, Rudhyar says this symbolizes “Companionship rooted in past performance,” ”Group personality emergence,“ and Fraternity of ideals uplifting individual efforts.”
He goes on to say in The Astrological Mandala that this refers to “the overtones of human relationships based on a community of work or experience.” It’s about the bond we share with others after we’ve done something together, where “activity is at the root of consciousness.”
He states it’s about generating social consciousness and patterns and in the process seeing the emergence of group consciousness and/or a “group personality.” He states “wherever this symbol appears, it suggests the importance of establishing or strengthening links with those with whom one has shared, or can share, living experiences.”
Ultimately, this is a degree of “comradeship.” This degree falls in the Span of Retention, and is the fifth, or culminating degree, of the Act of Group Integration in the Scene of Communion on the emotional-cultural level.
Dr. Marc E Jones, creator of the Sabian Symbols, says this is a degree of “human service,” and our need for the company of others. “Here the emphasis is on the physical and bodily essentials of life as the simplest possible factors in any social intercourse.”
He goes on to say that what we understand best in our own way becomes the basis for how we may appreciate others in our lives. We are told the keyword is FRATERNITY. He states that when operating in a positive manner, this degree is “an effective channeling of personal aspirations into the commonplace grooves of a shared experience.”
So this is a degree where we gather with others and feel the closeness and fellowship generated by what we’ve done together, or what we’re doing together. This indicates the future period influenced by this “fusion of life and mind” will help us know we are part of a group, whether we’ve recognized it in the past or not.
The next four months are a time to see that which needs to be eliminated, making space for other connections. This is a period of unusual interactive gifts and circumstances, where clear communications will be important, as well as the glimpses we get into deeper things. This will help us see how past losses stopped patterns so that other attractions could take place. We will definitely find interesting and roundabout ways to embrace the serendipity promised by the Inferior conjunction’s tredecile to Jupiter, as well as Saturn’s tredecile to Neptune. I’ll be writing more about these aspects in coming Eclipse articles.
Back To The Future – Remembering What Shaped Our Experience in 2004
Through the looking back yet to be done through the end of this Mercury RX period, we can see how we attracted or repelled what we did in the past, and how these created space we filled until it exhausted its attraction. Still, the coming months will bring highly specialized and fortunate opportunities to “reverse magnetism” to attract what we need in the future.
Some of what we will glimpse or remember will echo the lessons of December 2005, as well as what developed after June-July 2006. 10 Scorpio is also the degree where Mercury went stationary direct in November 2006, and stationary retrograde in October 2007. No doubt we’ll be remembering some things from 2006 and 2007 that involved Mercury and Jupiter. It may be a time to “undo the magnetism” from then, or seeing how that magnetism fed something related to group awareness.
Of course, this is also related to what Saturn has taught us about patience, duty, responsibility, and maturity Dec 2012-Jan 2013, March 2013, and Sept 2013. We can now review things about those periods, “re-feeling” how this brought us closer to some, and more distant from others. So whether this shows us a new understanding of past Jupiter and Mercury SRX/SD lessons, or more recent Saturn lessons, or reminders of lessons of those times, or even an “echo of the future” for what Mars will trigger in August 2014, this is a perfect example of how previous events can be brought front and center, or the possibility of getting glimpses of times to come by a Mercury retrograde. We will in some way be able to connect some dots from our 2006-07 experiences with our current situation that should help us deepen relations with those in our “group,” and bring many to a way to a uniquely favorable “result” through combining imagination and engineering .
We’ll continue to move through the current Mercury retrograde experience in early Scorpio until it goes direct at 3 Scorpio on November 10, 1:12 pm PST, 4:12 pm EST, 9:12 pm Greenwich. Between now and the third week of November when Mercury again crosses 10 Scorpio, we’re reorienting and reconfiguring things related to the theme of that degree. And as noted, Mars will stimulate these themes in the second week of August 2014.
What’s Up After the Inferior Conjunction?
As I pointed out in the first article about the Inferior Conjunction, at this Inferior Conjunction at 10 Scorpio we will have “a fusion of life and mind” that will help set a platform. In blending these principles we will see a shift in our affairs, attitudes, and understanding about those things symbolized by Mercury in Scorpio.
Natal points in harmony with 10 Scorpio will see productivity, understanding, stabilization, and unique qualities come forth. Natal points in friction with 10 Scorpio will see turning points, blocks, braking action, and release of potential. These are the primary “Life-Mind” fusion lessons through the next Superior Conjunction on Dec 28-29 at 8 Capricorn, a degree that will help us coordinate things so we can enjoy playing the roles we’re born to play.
So this Inferior Conjunction should bring a roundabout return, reflection, or echo from the past about prior rehearsals that have turned into realities since then, or how current rehearsals are forcing us to take care of what needs nourishment. It’s time to focus on creating space while participating in a fellowship, or seeing how the spaces we’ve created the past 7 years took away some old group members while introducing us to new ones. We can see old losses and defeats from a new angle of evolved being and self-awareness, or conversely, through the retrograde lens see how we’ve carried some things forward from the past and how these are affecting our current lives.
Venus introduced these energies when it first crossed this degree on September 18-19, followed by Mercury’s transit of this degree on October 6-7. The Inferior Conjunction now makes this a "hot spot" for months to come. One major factor at work in the chart for the Inferior Conjunction makes it clear that we will all find forms of the Saturn lessons of 2011, since the Moon in this chart is the exact degree where Saturn went stationary retrograde in January 2011.
Lessons for the next four months
Some of the primary lessons involve getting a central order to facilitate personality integration within a group setting. Find ways to integrate multiple life activities while not getting lost in too much going on. Follow your humanitarian instincts while giving attention to the details. Don’t take on too much or neglect things that are important.
While there is some volatility via the very close separating Uranus square Pluto, the latter is actually very well aspected in this chart, helping us finish expunging fear, learn how to be more “harmless” and/or kind in your interactions, and receiving rewards for cultivating a “culture of gentle interactions.” Adjust however you need to in order to see things from the past from a symbolic angle giving what happened a wider interpretation.
We may have to let go of some element of our past to open the door to self-renewal, and we can definitely expect a major “expansion through sacrifice,” given the powerful Yod, or Finger of God, at work via the Inferior Conjunction’s sextile with Mars and these in double quincunxes with Uranus.
The Moon in Libra will put the focus on “consequences,” whether current ones based in past actions and inactions, or future ones based in current actions and inactions. Given the Moon square Jupiter is the only aspect showing the ability to release energy, and Jupiter is quite well aspected in this chart, we can expect favorable releases of the serendipity, gifts and productivity indicated by the other aspects.
The aspects of note include those I’ve already addressed (especially the conjunction tredecile Jupiter and Yod!), as well as the conjunction sextile Pluto, Venus tredecile Mars, semisquare Saturn, and exactly biseptile Uranus, Sun conjunct Saturn, Mars septile Jupiter and sextile Saturn, Jupiter biseptile Uranus, and Saturn biquintile Uranus and tredecile Neptune. As you can see, Venus, Jupiter, and Uranus create a septile driven configuration, indicating that critical decisions that affect our future destiny related to this event will have to be made in areas involving Aries, Taurus, Cancer, Libra, Sagittarius, Capricorn, Aquarius, and Pisces, as well as the 7 “hot zones” created by this configuration.
Those zones involve 25-29 Sagittarius, 17-21 Aquarius, 8-12 Aries, 29 Taurus-3 Gemini, 20-24 Cancer, 12-16 Virgo, and 4-8 Scorpio. If you have a planet or angle in any of these zones, expect your destiny to take a turn in the future since you have critical choices to make over the next 4 months involving the houses your affected planets rule and occupy.
Mars septile Jupiter involves the same “fork in the road” energies, but different spans, since Mars does not make the same aspects with Venus and Uranus. In this case Mars septile Jupiter occurs just before the configuration explained in the previous paragraph, so expect a Martian activation just before the Venus-Jupiter-Uranus is activated.
So Just How Does the Process Work?
The Inferior Conjunction between Mercury and the Sun is the second step in a two-conjunction process. The first step is when Mercury conjuncts the Sun in forward motion after its retrograde period. This is called a “Superior conjunction.” Most recently this occurred at 2 Virgo on August 24-25, 2013.
As Mercury is faster than the Sun at any “Superior Conjunction,” after that event Mind again outraces Life, gets ahead of the Sun, and explores ideas and perceptions of experiences yet to occur. That’s what we experienced between mid-January and mid-February, when Mercury began to slow down.
After Mercury gets as far forward from the Sun as it can, it begins to slow, eventually going stationary retrograde. It then moves into the second step when Mercury again conjuncts the Sun while retrograde. This is when Mind is being absorbed by Life, or Life takes on the results of subconscious or collective ideas returning to source. Eventually Life gets as far from Mind as it can, Mercury goes stationary direct, and begins to speed up preparing for the first step anew in a different part of the zodiac.
Mercury Retrograde - Past As Prologue
In an interesting "co-incidence," many stationary points and Inferior Conjunction points make significant aspects to other points in previous Mercury retrograde periods. Perhaps by studying the sequence of retrograde, conjunction, and direct points we can see how Mercury, a.k.a Hermes, the Cosmic Magician and Guide of Souls, is steering our long range perceptions, understandings, and co-ordinations toward Soul understanding.
I pointed out earlier that the degree of the current Inferior Conjunct is exactly the same as where Mercury went both stationary direct and stationary retrograde in the Autumn of 2006 and again the Autumn of 2007. So this directly connects the dots between then and now. Also Jupiter went SD at 9 Scorpio July 2006, so this also relates to whatever Jupiter brought us as a result of that station.
This also gives new life to all previous Mercury stations involving Scorpio, all previous Eclipses in Scorpio, and all previous events, such as the various Autumnal Equinox charts with planets in Scorpio. Examples are the Equinox chart of 2010 had Venus at 10 Scorpio and Mars at 6 Scorpio, and the chart of the Autumn Equinox in 2012 had Mars at 20 Scorpio and NN at 28 Scorpio.
This also echoes various other celestial events. For example, the 2012 Winter Solstice, at the time heralded as the biggest deal of all time due to the ending of one of the many Mayan calendars, had Saturn 9 Scorpio. The Vernal Equinox of March 2013 had Saturn at 11 Scorpio, and the Summer Solstice had Saturn at 6 Scorpio.
Obviously this Inferior Conjunction has some effect on the coming Hybrid Solar Eclipse coming down this Sunday at 12 Scorpio. It no doubt will also echo effects from the 2012 Solar Eclipse at 22 Scorpio where Saturn was at 5 Scorpio and the NN was at 27 Scorpio, as well as the 2013 Solar Eclipse at 20 Taurus, where Saturn was at 8 Scorpio and the NN was at 17 Scorpio. And of course, the recent Lunar Eclipse had the NN at 8 Scorpio, Saturn at 13 Scorpio, and Mercury stationary retrograde at 19 Scorpio. These all may be factors in what happens as our “mind looking backward” fuses with life as we are living it.
We also may see echoes of other Inferior Conjunctions, since the last one in July 2013 occurred at 18 Cancer, in wide trine to this one. This one is trine the Inferior Conjunction in March at 15 Pisces, which was tredecile the 2012 Inferior Conjunction at 26 Scorpio. We also see that the February 2013 Mercury SRX point at 20 Pisces was in a close trine to the 2012 Mercury SD point at 19 Scorpio.
19 Scorpio is the exact degree this Mercury went stationary retrograde! Taking a look back (always a good thing when Mercury is retrograde!), we were told by Rudhyar that 19 Scorpio is a degree of “channelship,” so between late 2012 and early 2013 we all listened to the inner voice to hear what we needed to hear, which is now front and center again via the retrograde process.
So we moved that Scorpio “message” of late 2013 and early 2013 into the stable expression via the SRX 20 Pisces point in March, as well as the last Inferior Conjunction point at 15 Pisces. As it created a very harmonious void in Cancer, the Summer of 2013 was the next step in that natural progression of Water energies.
These were directly related to the elimination, repair, or regeneration work associated with Scorpio that we had to do in December 2012, January, and early February 2013 that moved forward between February and April via the Pisces degrees. In general, the magnetic work done during those months led us to a point of looking back to say goodbye so we could acquire the emotional intelligence and fluidity we developed last Summer.
This Inferior Conjunction of mind "looking back" into life will help us take a new look at how we have or have not taken care of what matters since the last retrograde in Cancer. We’ve closed out a lot the past few years, and there have been drastic losses for many since 2006.
This Inferior Conjunction in Scorpio gives us a new look or new understanding about how we have or have not found closure on these old elements of our lives that required a previous elimination and/or regeneration of something before we could move into those closures. It may also show us how we need to get back on track through examining how the past few months have shown us the way to resurrect past understanding of these possibilities and renew our lives over these past 4 months.
What About Mars’ Influence?
The fact that the Inferior Conjunction falls in Scorpio makes Mars the ruler of the conjunction. Mars currently is at 11 Virgo. This means that through the "looking back" and alternative views and understandings, we will get insights into the lessons Jupiter opened for us in October 2003 and March through June 2004 that were crystallized into our energy field by Saturn when it occupied 11 Virgo in August 2008.
Mars activates whatever it touches. It is known as “the Exciting Intelligence,” and severs what must be severed so that a greater way can be embraced with enthusiasm. The Inferior Conjunction is about feeling more connected with others and finding fellowship and group consciousness. The Inferior Conjunction is ruled by Mars, making it a very powerful factor in coordinating events so we can be led to our Soul.
As Mars’ duality is “Grace/Sin,” we will see how our consciousness and responses are “manifesting error or truth, maladjustment or beauty,” as the venerable Arhat Paul Foster Case put it. Mars is where we learn whether we’re forcing things and trying to push the river, or confront abrasive, aggressive, or hostile energies in ourselves and others. Mars teaches us how to sever what must be severed, and further what must be furthered, quickly and directly.
As the backdrop to how our mind and life relate to each other, perhaps we can learn how to deal with Martian energies in ourselves or others from a different angle of view, organizing or reorganizing or ideas, perception, interpretations, and way of communicating. This is about new forms of expression in action, and the challenge to use imagination and engineering to give reality and depth to things. It will show us whether or not we are “conforming to our inner light,” and give new understanding of how to be more productive as we take initiative in the next 4 months.
All in all, the coming 4 months will bring interesting returns, reflections, and rehearsals of how and what we’ve dealt with past losses, and can bring us needed insights into our magnetism so we can find the connections we need. Once the Inferior Conjunction happens, whatever has seemed delayed, postponed, or dragging along will move forward soon. This can bring forth a greater feeling-awareness, a greater sense of connection to our family, real or spiritual, and anchor us in ways that support who we are.
Generally, the 11 days before the inferior conjunction (fusion) of mind and life is a good time to take a new look at how you can bring out your inner wisdom by adjusting to a future vision or broader perspective that's opening for you. It's also good for getting a new point of view regarding what your imagination is willing to consider and how to coordinate your life to reorganize it productively.
It's great for intuitive flashes, insights into the larger collective consciousness and unconsciousness, and seeing how you're being led to see elements of your Soul you may not have recognized before now. So think back on what's happened in the past couple of weeks, and find a new way to view how those things may symbolize the future somehow.
Just remember during retrogrades, especially Mercury retrograde, that often things that don't turn out one way lead directly or indirectly to other things somewhat related manifesting down the road. It's as though nothing should be taken at face value, and often what we do or think during Mercury retrograde creates odd echoes in the future that take different shapes, or different functions related to the original intention.
And as usual, here are links to recent articles on what this October-November 2013 Mercury Retrograde in Scorpio is all about:
Here’s what I’ve composed on this Mercury Retrograde so far:
The Guide of Souls in October 2013 - Mercury Slowing Down, Preparing to go Retrograde at 19 Scorpio
Mercury Retrograde – A Repeat Look At the Guide of Souls
Scorpio 2013-2014 – Mercury Retrograde Helping Us Take A New Look At Deep Parts of Our Being Pt. 1
Mercury Retrograde in October-November 2013 – How This Retrograde Relates To Past Retrogrades
Copyright © 2013 Robert Wilkinson
This is a truly excellent article, Robert.
It really spoke to me. Thank you.
Posted by: Iris | November 01, 2013 at 09:23 AM
My moon is at this degree and I've been through the most intense growing experience for the past 2 1/2 years. A solo journey; very lonely but learned rich inner lessons. Currently I am quitting a job that has provided me with immense healing and will be reunited with my biological father for the first time. My mum died in childbirth and there's been so much pain. It was an astrologer who told me I'm my mother's legacy and not her passing. That was so life changing. I am 30 and a twin. My life has been on hold for so long and I finally feel that once I have peace with my past; I'll begin to start my own life/family. So happy.
Posted by: Sair | November 05, 2013 at 09:08 PM
& Also thank you for this article! It's so chewy and detailed, I've bookmarked it and will be studying it for awhile. Much appreciated. So timely.
Posted by: Sair | November 05, 2013 at 09:31 PM
So that explains why I've been in the dumps lately. I'm usually such a happy person, seeing the good in all. But I've been depressed and crying at the drop of a hat. I want it to go away!!! I don't like being unhappy. I want to be my old self again.
Oh well, I know I will. Just had to vent a bit.
Posted by: Becky Mortize | November 15, 2013 at 12:42 AM